Yesterday, we discussed 12 of the most wasteful government expenditures in 2014. It involved waste from many corners of government, but one entity that escaped our roast was the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Someone must have it out for the folks over at DHS because today it was revealed that the people in charge of keeping track of terrorists can’t even keep track of its employees’ payroll.
The Washington Times has reported that DHS has awarded hundreds of millions of dollars in overtime pay without verifying if the overtime was warranted or whether the employees in question even worked the hours they claimed. Over the years, untold millions have gone from government coffers (stocked by taxpayers) and into the pockets of border patrol agents. A loophole in the federal payroll program has allowed “Administratively Uncontrollable Overtime” (AUO) payments since as far back as 2007. Yes, that’s right, the people in charge of securing our nation’s borders can’t even secure their own employees’ behavior.
Now, it seems as though multiple U.S. government agencies tasked with the security of U.S. taxpayers have been piling on the overtime – whether or not it was deserved. Here’s how bad things have gotten:
● The Department of Homeland Security paid $512 million in overtime to employees in 2013.
● $255 million in overtime payments went out from the D of D during the first six months of 2014 alone.
● U.S. Customs employees finagled about $394 million in overtime pay in 2013.
Some of these AUO payments are credible, as they are paid out to staff who are working in remote areas, tracking suspects, working undercover or otherwise not in a “clock in, clock out” position. In March 2013, however, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that in fiscal year 2012 millions of dollars in unjustifiable overtime payments were approved.
In March 2013, the GAO found about $2 million in non-qualifying overtime payments were given to chemical security inspectors by the DHS National Protection and Programs Directorate. DHS did not even review the payments in question.
More recently, as much as $16.5 million in AUO payments have been identified as fraudulent or unauthorized. That’s barely more than 3% of the total overtime payment waste paid out last year. To add insult to injury, GAO agency director Jim Crumpacker had the gall to say, “DHS takes its responsibility to be good stewards of taxpayer dollars and uphold the public trust very seriously.”
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