Open the Books just released a comprehensive report on the EPA’s spending habits since 2000. When asked about the report, EPA spokespersons were thrown for a loop and exposed as budget deniers.
The spokespersons had no real answers for these expenditures:
- $6.4 million on military-style weaponry
- $92 million on high-end furniture costs
- $170 million on public relations
- $715 million spent on the Criminal Enforcement Program
- $1 billion on their Senior Employment Program
- $1.2 billion on 1,020 staff lawyers.
Instead of answering the questions, the spokespersons turned to rhetoric saying, "Many purchases were mis-characterized or blown out of proportion in the report." But all of these numbers are factual and accurate. So is spending north of 3 billion dollars blown out of proportion?
Adam Andrzejewski, President of Open the Books, had this to say:
Taxpayers should be concerned as the agency pushes forward to a new era of the "thin green line." EPA "special agents" armed with millions of dollars in military-style equipment, weaponry, and backed by 1,020 in-house lawyers – with a budget larger than eight states – feel emboldened to "separate the good from the bad."
The EPA’s reckless control of the taxpayers’ checkbook deserves real answers, not rhetoric.