Gov't credit cards for Katrina draw fire ($250,000 each for 250,000)

By HOPE YEN, Associated Press Writer 36 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - Lawmakers and watchdog groups worry that allowing federal employees to charge up to $250,000 on their government-issued credit cards for Hurricane Katrina-related expenses will lead to a repeat of past abuses.
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About 250,000 federal employees have government credit cards, which typically have a purchase limit of $2,500. At the request of the Bush administration, Congress increased the credit line to $250,000 as part of a massive Katrina recovery bill approved last week. The aim is to make it easier to speed aid to victims.
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Purchases are billed directly to the government, making it difficult to recover losses from wayward federal employees intent on fraud because of the time lag from the purchase date to subsequent billing.
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Cronyism also is a danger, as officials have more leeway under the higher limit to purchase more expensive supplies from politically connected companies without the benefit of open bidding and competition. Even if they're detected, time-strapped agency directors often don't pursue disciplinary action, according to audit reports.
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http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/katrina_credit_cards

of fiscal repsonsibility?

Is my math off, or did they just make the taxpayer liable for up to $62.5 BILLION?

n/t

compared to the Iraq war, but 26 times the 'one-time transfer' of $100 bills shipped to Iraq in a C130 plane.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0622-04.htm

came up with to. It is also what they approved for Katrina.

Let's not finance this disaster with Treasury bonds at 4%, let's do it with credit cards at 29.9%

n/t

I get credit card solicitations from those banks and it really freaks me out.

Have I been "pre-approved," yet?

:crazy:

Yaaaaaaaaaaay! Your tax dollars at work!!!!

Do as I do, not as I say.

in the debit cards. Yeah, give the homeless a quarter-million each!

the government cards I know of bill to the holder, who then submits the bill to his/her office for payment.

Or they yank it. I have one. This is way overblown. No way you can prevent some abuse like anything else, but there are penalties like everything else. Firing, Prison.

and the government cuts her a check to pay for it.

maybe the Smithsonian does it differently, but she is a federal employee.

The story is correct, the purchase card bill goes to the gvt.

thanks-

But malfeasence with money is truly only penalized at the lower levels (civil rights, abuse etc.,is not enforced, only money stuff), it takes a whistleblower to make upper gov people answerable, last two agency heads of my agency fell that way,and of course the man at the top is never made to account

The Bush Justice Department? The people who sent Martha Stewart to prison but have not brought Ken Lay to trial?

It does make sense in the circumstances to raise the limits on some purchase cards, so that the emergency workers in the area can do what's needed without having to arrange things with their office, and credit cards are more widely and quickly accepted than government purchase orders.
But raising the limit for everyone doesn't make sense. Don't they have a list of people that are actually in the area? do they really have that many government employees with purchase cards down there? Or is it that they just have no idea of who's working down there, so they upped the limit for everyone.

My guess is that if the Republicans are doing it, it's been done corruptly.

to review the statements and check them for fraud? You could save the government the cost of the fraudulent purchases while giving the people a short-term employment solution- paying them a fair wage, and you'd still come out way ahead on the savings...

Nah, that would be a sensible thing to do.

Is that how Condi paid for her Ferragamos?