Government bean-counters have had a bad couple of weeks. Military installations have been losing equipment, the IRS flunked an audit, and now the U.S. General Accounting Office has raised troubling questions about a Superfund cleanup site in Midvale.
The Sharon Steel cleanup project shows, if nothing else, that the Environmental Protection Agency isn't serious enough about its responsibility to taxpayers. Not only did the project cost 15 percent more than was budgeted, no one seems to be able to document how much of the money went toward cleanup and how much went toward administrative costs — a polite way of saying some money may have been appropriated by profiteers.
Sharon was an enormous and costly project. Not only were tons of tailings capped with an earthen cover, but the lawns and trees in many surrounding neighborhoods were completely removed to rid the area of harmful lead deposits. Millions of gallons of water were needed to keep contaminated dust from spreading. In the end, the project cost $75.8 million.
But when one is tossing about tens of millions of dollars, the tendency is to become careless with minute details. The EPA administers about $8 billion annually, which is more than enough to let a few million slip through the cracks. Sharon isn't the only example of questionable accounting. The GAO has found similar problems at other Superfund sites.
A state lawmaker in Colorado last month began pushing for the establishment of an independent ombudsman in that state to oversee the EPA, which he accused of a pattern of lies and coverups. Congress, meanwhile, has planned hearings this year into how the agency manages the approximately $4 billion it awards in grants each year. Rep. Tillie Fowler, R-Fla., told the Washington Post "There is strong evidence that EPA is not fulfilling its obligation to monitor and oversee what is happening to its grants."
The danger, according to these critics, is that the EPA is awarding grants as political favors or to further the aims of the Clinton administration. The real danger to taxpayers is that an agency with access to their wallets is being careless, at best.
At the moment, the truth of these allegations is open to speculation. But the evidence of poor oversight is compelling. The EPA is handing out money without demanding accountability. It has, in some instances, awarded the same grant money twice for the same project. In Utah, it financed a cleanup without knowing exactly where the money was going.
That's disgraceful. Maybe Utah can't afford to set up its own agency to watch the EPA, but it ought to demand a better accounting.