Monday, July 26, 2010
Arkansas Politics The cars — and the plane
Posted by Max Brantley on Mon, Jul 26, 2010 at 10:55 AM
Republican gubernatorial candidate Jim Keet is going to repeat himself at a press conference today about presumed abuse of the state vehicle fleet. Remains to be seen if he has anything new to say. He's apparently going to whip this horse as long as he can.
I did have this stray thought: 8,500 state vehicles. At an average cost of $10,000 each (low unless the numbers are swollen by an abundance s of golf cart-style vehicles on college campuses and the like), you're talking about $85 million worth of vehicles, just in purchase price, never mind fuel and maintenance. Real money. But perhaps justified money. It could be time for some justifying. Keet also might want to call tax fugitive Mike Huckabee down in Florida (where Keet was a voter himself until recently) to ask him how he allowed the fleet to grow so big during his 10 years as governor.
Oh, and it was Huck who flew that last plane into the ground advancing his political career. The state was forced to buy a new one for the State Police, which actually uses it for law enforcement duties. Keet wants to sell it.
Speaking of...
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Bipartisan group forms to put ethics measure on ballot
May 11, 2012A bipartisan triumvirate has taken the lead on the new Better Ethics Now Committee to get this proposition on the ballot. /more/
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Petrino exchanged 200 texts with Repub bikini model UPDATE
April 12, 2012n a two-month span last fall, Bobby Petrino exchanged over 200 text messages — including some picture messages — with a cell phone registered to a 26-year-old bikini model and UALR alum who worked with the Young Republicans of Arkansas and on Jim Keet's 2010 run for governor /more/
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Comments (17)
Showing 1-17 of 17
The government always has excess car money, don't forget, government budgets are just a bottomless pit of free money. So it really doesn't matter how much they spend, there will always be more. We can just raise taxes.
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I am sure the number of state vehicles has grown under most Governors. A more interesting thing might be which dealerships have benefitted the most from the $85 million(conservative) expenditure.
I want to know where you can buy any new car for 10 thousand dollars. Are we buying fleets of those tiny little cars from India?
The breakdown of dealers involved .vs. their donations would be an interesting chart.
This subject is a 'real' reporters dream. Every aspect of it could be mined for a new story every week between now & election day. And not a single political party would be innocent, except of course the Greens - they got no power anyway --- yet!
Forget cars....how much is spent on coffee and toliet paper? One person's "waste" is another person's salary or profit. The thing that needs to be focused on in this state is the regressive nature of out tax system. Poorer areas have the highest tax rates due to low tax bases. Yet nobody wants to talk about that. No, let's keep talking about bullshit.
One area of government waste that does not benefit Arkansans is TRAVEL. Specifically travel out of state. That is money actually wasted from a state standpoint because it leaves the state. Cut all the travel to conferences that could be held over the internet or by phone.
needs,
how about queen martha's out of state junkets?
that is the next shoe to drop.
Here’s the real truth of the matter, kids: If Arkinsaw’s lazy-assed, unqualified-yet-HIGHLY-paid state employees (say, for example, the sanitarians who inspect restaurant kitchens) drove their own cars to greasy spoons all over the state and paid for gasoline, oil, car maintenance, and insurance out of their own pockets, we’d STILL find plenty about them and their jobs to bitch about. That's because we're vastly superior to the lowlifes. What a pity WE ain’t in charge. ‘Cause, by God, we’d get this deadwooded state straightened out, wouldn't we? Dang tootin’ we would.
I try to never use a state car, but I can vouch for the toilet paper. Not Charmin Aloe and E quality, but better than the thin see-through stuff that hangs in most public stalls. Just for the record!
Just a couple of examples regarding the car mess and areas where cleaning up could occur quite easily:
1) DFA shows cars for Stormes and Leathers and Weiss. Why do Stormes and Leathers and Weiss deserve cars? They work across the street from the capitol building, so ALL of their work is either at the capitol or in their office building directly across the street. The only travel any of them have to do is walking across the street, unless you want to count in to and from home and stopping off by Cuffs or the liquor store or grocery. See, though they have those little red license plates, there seems to be a real lack of other identification the vehicle designating it as state owned. So it is pretty easy to do all the honey-do type stuff on the way home and who is to know?
2) AGFC has a HR director, whose job by definition is in the office in LR, who lives in Benton and is allowed a vehicle to commute. Sole purpose of the vehicle...for the HR director to commute. Period. And while we are talking AGFC, I remember about 3 years ago, several AGFC types were having a lucheon confab out at Faded Rose on Rebsamen. The parking lot contained 6 or 8 big old four door four wheel drive Chevrolets, tricked out with the latest in personal comfort accessories and sound systems, and each and every one had the name of a dealer on the tailgate. And it was the same dealer. And the dealer listed Lawton, Oklahoma as their hometown. So our tax money is going to buy vehicles out of state and these vehicles are being provided to folks to enable them to commute.
Take away the vehicles and there is not a single state employee who will up and quit over the outrage. Not one.
So, let's see an accounting of the miles driven by state employees and how closely it coincides with the distance they commute each day. Are they doing any driving other than commuting and personal errands? If not, why in the world do they have a vehicle? Then let's see where those automobiles are purchased. I would rather the good-old boy network in Arkansas get them and then we could clean that up as to giving them to hunting and fishing buddies out of state. We lose all the way around when that is the case.
Sundown (aka King Bobby Tullis),
Shoffner is one of many that travel to conferences. It's part of the job. Most travel by state employees is not necessary though in my opinion.
Some outfit is bringing in another aircraft for the state to consider over the Labor Day weekend, when they hope nobody will notice. Details on www.flytheford.org
It amazes me that Keet thinks this is a good issue for him. Leasing instead of owning? Great way to get ripped off on anything, even a plane. As the article Max links to says, the bean counters already figured out what was the cheapest option for taxpayers, but Jim Keet would rather fork over a premium instead by leasing.
did keet forget who the real abuser of the state plane was? huckabee!!!
every time jim keet makes an attack, it's on an issue that either makes him or his party look stupid. if i were him, i'd try to stay away from thngs that make Huck look bad like the plane stuff -- he's the best hope of keet raising some money!
when this plane stuff came up on saturday there was some republican who chimed in on one of these threads and said keet was going too use his own plane and have state pay him back. do we know anything else about that?
it seems like a crazy plan worthy of jim keet but is it really true? would love to hear jim keet explain it out of his own mouth that taxpayers are going to pay for his plane. that's the part of the story i want to see the media report on. jim keet, man of the people!!!
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