The results of the state’s audit of the Northstar commuter rail project were released today and “no major legal issues were noted.” Something stinks in Buffalo though. The NCDA and Anoka County Rail Project may have each paid contractors for the same services, and the NCDA head spent an average of $40 at 222 meals with little documentation as to why the public should be footing the bill. Maybe he was doing market research at Joe’s Crab Shack?
No Surprises in Northstar Audit
Feb 6 2006 — 2:00am
6 Reader Comments
5:39 pm
Choo choo!
10:56 pm
The meal reimbursement limit for me is like ten bucks.
9:00 am
These agencies are pikers when it comes to double talking the press concerning audits. Check out this example from today’s StPPP from the real pros who work for the State:
“The legislative auditor’s report, which recommended a host of legislative and administrative changes, found Minnesota has the 15th least cost-effective program nationwide and had the second smallest caseload per child-support employee in the country in 2004. For all its bulk, however, it did better than most states on four of five federal performance measures.”
The article is a good primer for dealing with audits:
1. Point out that things could have been worse.
2. Pick out the good points and play them up.
3. Gloss over the problem areas, which you’re already in the process of studying and adressing anyway.
4. Blame somebody else.
5. Ask for more money.
9:32 am
Although I gotta admit; getting the paper to devote space to $8,800 for meals on a $274,000,000 total expenditure was downright inspirational. I guess eating was the only part of the auditors report the “journalists” could really comprehend?
9:51 am
I worked for the federal government for a couple of years and one thing I learned was agency people are masters of claiming all sorts of accomplishments for actually doing absolutely NOTHING. So as they do nothing real, Government agencies scramble to spend all there money on anything just so their budget can increase every year. Money management at a government agency has nothing to do with spending wisely or saving money. The best “work” is to constantly talk about something, form committees, have roundtables, think up initiatives, hold meetings, go to conferences (in nice places) and never actually do anything. This Northstar Rail thing is a boondoggle that will just keep eating money and giving government officials something to put on their list of “accomplishments”.
10:21 am
one thing I learned was agency people are masters of claiming all sorts of accomplishments for actually doing absolutely NOTHING.
I hope you don’t think that such crap is unique to government. I work in the corporate world, and to a degree, that’s exactly what many of the people I work with are masters of as well.