RAT Board Calls Out "Two-Time Losers"

By Elizabeth Newell

The Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board today is posting the names and awards of stimulus recipients who failed to file reports for the months of October through December of last year. These recipients received 1,036 awards representing $583 million in Recovery Act funds, the watchdog panel is reporting.

Recipients who did not file reports either of the last two quarters of last year -- and these "two-time losers" together received 389 awards - will also be publicly shamed on the "Errors, Omissions, Non-Reported Awards" page of Recovery.gov.

"The two-time losers--those who failed to file reports in the last quarter of 2009 and the earlier reporting period--should really be embarrassed,'' said Earl E. Devaney, the Chairman of the Recovery board. "They took millions of dollars and then thumbed their noses at taxpayers.''

Devaney noted that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 imposes no penalty on recipients that fail to report - other than a tongue-lashing, of course. He has previously testified before Congress in support of establishing penalties in the law. Additionally, he encouraged federal agencies to use their administrative powers to punish the "losers" where possible.

"Federal agencies now need to take whatever administrative action they can against those who flout the law so cavalierly, including recovering money that the recipients have not yet spent.''

A veteran of nearly 40 years in law enforcement, Devaney said that he was particularly disappointed that some of the 389 two-time losers included police departments that received COPS grants from the Depart­ment of Justice but failed to submit reports to the Recovery Board. "It is very disturbing to me,'' he said, "that a police department would decide that it does not have to comply with a law.''

The one "bright spot" of this announcement, Devaney said, is that most of the recipients who previously failed to submit reports did so in the last quarter.