by Marie Diamond Published: Thursday 8 September 2011
Think Progress / News Report
A report this year by the inspector general of the U.S. Homeland Security Department criticized the state’s management of Homeland Security grants from 2006 to 2008
In the years since the Sept. 11 attacks, Texas has received at least $1.7 billion from the Department of Homeland Security, with little accountability over how lawmakers spent the money. Instead of using the federal DHS grants to strengthen the state’s security, officials often used the funds for personal extravagances like sports cars:
[A] Fort Worth Star-Telegram examination of thousands of purchases also found a $21 fish tank in Seguin, a $24,000 latrine on wheels in Fort Worth, and a real pork project — a hog catcher in Liberty County.
Homeland Security paid for body bags, garbage bags and Ziploc bags.
If taxpayers had a say, they might have gone along with some purchases, such as $24,012 in body armor for the Houston Metropolitan Transit Authority. But what about the two 2011 Camaros, each $30,884, used in Kleberg County border enforcement?
A report this year by the inspector general of the U.S. Homeland Security Department criticized the state’s management of Homeland Security grants from 2006 to 2008.
The audit concluded that Texas passed on Homeland Security funds to local governments “without adequately defined goals and objectives to strengthen preparedness and response to attacks or disasters.” Instead of monitoring how local officials were performing their responsibilities, the state asked them to rate their own performance. Predictably, without oversight from the state government, local officials used the money as they saw fit — which included expenses that had nothing to do with making citizens safer. […CONTINUED…]
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