CAGW Herding Piglets in Nevada and California
October 17, 2008
by: Sarah Maroney

Government WasteWatch, Fall/Winter 2008

In 2002, Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) moved beyond its historical mission as a federal budget watchdog and focus a portion of our resources on investigating profligate spending in the states. Using the expertise garnered from two decades of fighting waste, fraud, and abuse in the federal government, CAGW reached out to the growing network of state-based public policy and taxpayer organizations to develop a new publication the Piglet Book.

To date, CAGW has partnered with statebased public policy and taxpayer organizations to author 24 Piglet Books in 14 states. Taken together, these Piglet Books have identified more than $51 billion in wasteful, outmoded, and inefficient state spending. Since CAGW released its first Piglet Book, these headline-grabbing publications have become important blueprints showing state policymakers how to close budget gaps through spending cuts and management reforms with resorting to tax increases.

In September, CAGW released its latest installments, the 2008 California Piglet Book and 2008 Nevada Piglet Book.

This year’s California Piglet Book is the outcome of a collaborative effort between CAGW and the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Foundation. Topping the list of California’s fiscally-misguided expenditures is a high-speed rail system (HSR) proposal which will appear on the state’s ballot in November as Proposition 1A. If passed, the state will build a high-speed rail between the San Francisco Bay Area and Sacramento to Los Angeles and San Diego. The 2008 California Piglet Book features a summary of The California High Speed Rail Proposal: A Due Diligence Report by Wendell Cox and Joseph Vranich, which challenges many important aspects of the HSR proposal. While the initial plan calls for $54.3 billion, the Due Diligence Report projects a final cost of between $65.2 billion and $81.4 billion.

Other state spending outrages include $1 million for 51 California Highway Patrol vans. The California Bureau of State Audits found that the 51 vans have been driven a paltry 401 miles combined. In addition, it was reported that the California Department of Transportation has spent $3 million to pay for 30 vans to transport farm workers to and from their fields. It may be of particular interest in view of the fact that California’s Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger (R), may be asking for a $7 billion loan in order to pay for state law enforcement, hospitals, and firefighting in the wake of the turmoil in the credit markets. Perhaps the California Piglet could provide a blueprint for eliminating billions in wasteful spending rather than seeking federal loans.

The 2008 Nevada Piglet Book, which was released on September 18, 2008 in conjunction with the Nevada Policy Research Institute, highlights hidden spending in the Silver State. The report lists multiple outrageous examples of waste, including the trials and tribulations of the Clark County School District (CCSD) which in 2005 hired the German software company SAP to consolidate its back-office operations into a single, integrated system called an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) project at an estimated cost of $25 million. CCSD went ahead with the plan despite the immense cost overruns experienced by other school districts around the country which had attempted to implement similar ERP projects. Predictably, costs have spiraled. They already exceed $35 million, while a further $12 million will be requested to complete the project.

In Washoe County, $2,000 was spent on an “Earth Day Celebration,” along with $1,700 for two barbeque grills. Also, Clark County records show that $44,439 went to arts, crafts, and other party supplies. Recently, Las Vegas City Council members spent $1,200 for personalized engraved pencils bearing Councilman Steve Wolfson’s name. One thousand dollars was wasted on beach balls bearing Councilman Steve Ross’s name.

These examples only scratch the surface of the wasteful spending exposed in the two reports. The complete 2008 California Piglet Book and 2008 Nevada Piglet Book are available at www.cagw.org.