by D. Cupples Back in December, I blogged about a Florida contractor that got nearly 32 million tax dollars to build barracks
and offices or Iraqi military units -- though nothing was ever built, because the
project
was abandoned.
Last week, the Washington Post reported on a government audit about California contractor Parsons of Pasedena, which received 142 million tax dollars to build prisons, fire stations and police facilities in Iraq that the contractor never built or never finished. Think of what our government could do with that wasted $142 million. At the very least, that money could be used to pay down our nearly $9.5 trillion national debt.
The Washington Post reports:
"Parsons won its lucrative deal in 2004 to do security and justice work in Iraq, as part of a dozen other big reconstruction deals. Of 53 construction projects in the Parsons contract, only 18 were completed.
"Auditors gave Parsons a scathing report on one of its biggest projects -- a multimillion-dollar prison in Diyala that was to house 1,800 inmates and help alleviate overcrowded facilities -- calling it a failure and wasteful. The U.S. government fired Parsons from the prison contract two years ago, saying it was late and over budget. It paid Parsons $31 million, and then paid other contractors $9 million to keep working on the project.
"But now the prison -- known as Kahn Bani Sa'ad Correctional Facility -- sits unfinished and dilapidated. Local residents have derisively nicknamed it "the whale." At one of the buildings, the second floor is without a roof. Gray cement walls jut up in the sky. There is no plumbing or electricity. Windows have not been put in, and walls are unpainted. Roads in the complex remain unpaved.
"Al al-Mayahi, who said he was one of the subcontractors on the project, said that when the floors began to collapse because of poor materials used in their construction, the Americans refused to pay one of the Iraqi contractors on the deal and the man fled. In the past two years, al Mayahi said, nothing's been done on the project. "I'm disappointed with this entire project," said al Mayahi, who said he was also owed money on the project.
"About 400 Iraqi soldiers have been camped out at the site for about a week to prepare for a major military operation in Diyala, according to Lt. Col. Ali al-Suaidi. He was horrified at the state of the building. (Washington Post)
As the posts linked below indicate, contractor waste, fraud, and abuse are costing our nation piles of money -- money that we could instead spend on health care, energy, weapons, troop supplies....
Related Buck Naked Politics Posts:
* IRS Contractors Cost More than They Collect
* High Cost of Private Contractors
* Defense Dept. Rewarding Bad Contractor Performance?
* Insurance Companies Get Away with Overbilling Medicare
* U.S. Embassies: Still More Examples of Problems with Contractors
* Contractor UNISYS in Trouble Again
* How KBR Got $1 Billion in Non-Credible Costs
* Blackwater Took Iraqi Airplanes, CEO Misled Congress?
* Bush-tied Saudi Fugitive Gets $80 Million Contract
* Contractor Supplies Bad Ammo, Gets Hundreds of Millions
* "Billions over Baghdad": Poor Accounting Enabled Contractor Waste/Fraud
* Inspector General Blocked Investigations re: Waste and Fraud?
* Justice Dept. Official Turned Blind Eye to Contractor Fraud?
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