By Danny Fenster
ticklethewire.com
Folks like talk show host Bill O’Reilly talked incessantly about the government spending $16 a muffin at a conference even after press reports began to surface that the Justice Department report on the issue probably wasn’t true. The Hilton hotel had disputed it all along, saying the price included multiple breakfast items.
Well, now it’s really official. Last week the Justice Department’s inspector general issued a revised version of an earlier report on conference expenditures that had made front page headlines in September, reports Government Executive.
“After further review of the newly provided documentation and information,” acting Inspector General Cynthia Schnedar said in a statement, “we determined that our initial conclusions concerning the itemized costs of refreshments at the . . . conference were incorrect.”
The original report had made mention of $16.80 muffins at an August 2009 Justice Department event at the Capital Hilton in Washington, D.C. Calling the report a “wake-up call” on wasteful spending on conferences, Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, had called for the firing of some department employees at the time.
“We hope that our correction of the record for this one conference among the 10 conferences we reviewed does not detract from the more significant conclusion in our report: government conference expenditures must be managed carefully, and the department can do more to ensure that taxpayer dollars are spent wisely and accounted for properly,” the new report said.
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- Grassley Will Try to Block FOIA Rule Drafted by Justice (Main Justice)
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