ABC News Investigation Features CAGW President Tom Schatz

(Washington, D.C.) – Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) today applauded Department of Transportation (DOT) Secretary Ray LaHood’s decision Tuesday evening to suspend a $1.2 million Federal Highway Administration program that sends agency employees on lavish trips around the world to observe how other countries address issues such as outdoor advertising.  Sec. LaHood’s announcement came on the heels of ABC News informing DOT that it would air a report on the program.  The story was presented this morning by Chief Investigative Correspondent Brian Ross on Good Morning America and included comments from CAGW President Tom Schatz. 

The International Scan Program, part of DOT’s international highway outreach efforts, has cost taxpayers nearly $12 million since 2000.  Its ostensible purpose is to take federal and state transportation workers to popular tourist destinations around the world to study how to manage transportation networks.  Last Friday, eight Republican members of Congress challenged the DOT program after finding that the Federal Highway Administration sent a delegation on a 17-day trip to Australia, Sweden, The Netherlands, and Great Britain to look at billboards.  The bureaucrats were treated to dinners and lodging at five-star restaurants and hotels.  Their official report on the trip highlighted a “checklist for evaluating road furniture along rural roads in Scotland,” and “examples of outdoor advertising signs in Rotterdam, Netherlands,” among other supposedly vital findings, such as the fact that other countries prohibit any advertising signs that might be confused with official traffic signs.

Schatz told ABC News that “Taxpayers certainly should be outraged that their money is being spent on this type of activity when our roads are falling apart; gas prices and taxes are at an all-time high.  No one even gets to take a vacation like that.  It really is a ridiculous waste of our money.” 

Schatz added today that “proponents of increased government spending and higher gas taxes cite the dilapidated state of American highways and infrastructure as evidence that the government is not doing enough.  But if the International Scam Program is any indication, there is a lot of wasteful spending at DOT that could be redirected toward far greater priorities.  A DOT spokesman told ABC News that the program was on the chopping block weeks before yesterday’s call from the network; but the fact that a trip around the world to study pavement began on June 6 and ends on June 26 seems to belie that claim.  The end of this program shows what can be done when members of Congress, the media, and taxpayer advocates work together to expose wasteful spending.”

Citizens Against Government Waste is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud, mismanagement and abuse in government.