Maine Turnpike trip to Vienna IBTTA generates a story at home but the Turnpike got it out first
Posted Fri, 2007-10-05 20:24
Type
'Maine Turnpike' and 'Vienna' in a Google search box and you'll see
that the Turnpike delegation of five attending the IBTTA annual
conference in Vienna is big news back home. The list of stories goes on
for several pages. Most of them are variants of an AP story by Francis
X Quinn though one or two others picked up on it separately.
There's a stock storyline: public officials living high off the taxpayers... off you. It's a formula storyline.
Journalist fills in the template: Officials names & positions, exotic locale, partying details, spouses or girlfriends along for
the ride, any big restaurant or bar bills, total cost to taxpayers, get
quote from indignant citizen or official who missed out, detail
evasions coverup as evidence of guilt/shame, reference back to earlier
scandal/extravagence/ethical lapse, investigation, other followup.
This popular theme is based on an editor's hunch that there are a large
number of readers out there who live in perpetual breach of the tenth
commandment.
They covet.
Their lives are lived resentful of other people getting stuff they aren't getting, and they are suckers for stories designed to foster righteous indignation.
Usually the story results form a tipoff. But this one was different.
No one got a scoop. The Turnpike's PR man Dan Paradee wrote up a statement announcing the trip to IBTTA in Vienna Austria and gave it to local media and the AP:
Maine Turnpike Officials to Participate in
International Tolling Conference
"PORTLAND--Two Maine Turnpike executives and three members of the Board of Directors will meet with toll facility owners and operators from around the world at the annual meeting of the International Bridge Tunnel and Turnpike Association (IBTTA) in Vienna, Austria next week. The conference will bring together toll industry innovators to discuss and share information about the future...
Download the full Paradee statement here as MSWord doc.
The AP report was straight and fair. Main points:
Two execs and three board members going to the IBTTA meeting in Vienna.
Cost estimated at $26k, $5,200 each.
Quoted Paul Violette touting benefits of attending IBTTA, how it helped with improving toll technology, ET, ORT etc. Electronic tolling had saved 200k toll collector hours/year.
Background on IBTTA, every 4th conference is overseas.
Fuss last year over a $149/person for Turnpike people paid for by a consultant.
The Kennebec Journal was a little tougher. They quoted critics. A pol
Richard Cebra growled: "I think we should be focusing on maintaining
our infrastructure and not taking trips to Austria. I think there's
better ways to spend $26,000."
The chairman of the senate transportation committee Sen Dennis Damon called it "a little bit untimely" given discussion of tolls recently, but went on to defend professional conferences as "important" to attend.
"We are a global economy," he said. "Much of what we do and see is transferable back here and, to that extent, I can support it."
Another said the Turnpike authority is an independent agency which has to be trusted to spend its money wisely.
The Journal follows up with an editorial playing both sides of the street.
"That leadership at the turnpike authority is tone deaf is amply demonstrated by this trip. Just a year after the expensive dinner incident, did no one over there consider that a trip to Vienna - land of some very expensive pastry, we'd note - might cause a few raised eyebrows? Perhaps attendance at a conference on public relations for quasi-governmental agencies might also be in order."
Then they defended the conference: "That this trip is a junket and a
waste of taxpayers' money is not entirely true. A conference in Austria
is an expensive proposition... Five thousand dollars and change for
each attendee's trip cost seems high.
"Yet the turnpike authority's budget last year was $106 million, making this outlay just 0.0245 percent of the agency's annual spending.
"Furthermore, it isn't taxpayer money that supports the turnpike authority, it's toll-payer money (many toll-payers are, of course, Maine taxpayers). Almost 80 percent of the agency's income is from tolls; the remaining 20 percent comes from concession rentals on the turnpike.
"And ask almost anyone who goes to professional conferences: There are many things to be learned at them. Socializing, eating, touring - those are also part of a conference. But the meat of them is the exchange of important and timely information, which helps attendees do their jobs better when they get home."
Touchy feely stuff
Then they turned again: "And yet ... it still doesn't look or feel right. When the governor has asked state lawmakers to trim $10 million from the latest budget, when lowering taxes is going to take further painful cuts in state spending, the prospect of two state agency staffers and three board members getting on a plane to Europe for a conference rankles.
"We can see the argument for sending staff to Vienna. We can almost see the argument for sending a board member -- the turnpike authority's board members work hard and are deeply involved in the activities of an agency that spends more than a hundred million dollars a year."
Staff they could see should go and perhaps one board member but not three...
Now there's micromanagement for you.
HCTRA - another scandal that wasn't
And in Houston Mike Strech after being forced out as director of the Harris County Toll Road Authority in May this year for soliciting funds for the annual staff summer party from vendors has been vindicated - more or less. The county auditor found he did nothing illegal. Money raised - $170k over five years - was properly accounted for, and properly spent, and some was left unspent in a properly named bank account. Â
However county bosses thought the practice of soliciting vendors was "inappropriate" and showed "poor judgment" and the county auditor concurred. No more party at vendor expense at HCTRA. Strech went to the vendors in the first place he because he didn't want to hit up the toll road budget.
Only partying left is pay at the gate.
TOLLROADSnews 2007-10-05
Type
'Maine Turnpike' and 'Vienna' in a Google search box and you'll see
that the Turnpike delegation of five attending the IBTTA annual
conference in Vienna is big news back home. The list of stories goes on
for several pages. Most of them are variants of an AP story by Francis
X Quinn though one or two others picked up on it separately.There's a stock storyline: public officials living high off the taxpayers... off you. It's a formula storyline.
Journalist fills in the template: Officials names & positions, exotic locale, partying details, spouses or girlfriends along for
the ride, any big restaurant or bar bills, total cost to taxpayers, get
quote from indignant citizen or official who missed out, detail
evasions coverup as evidence of guilt/shame, reference back to earlier
scandal/extravagence/ethical lapse, investigation, other followup.
This popular theme is based on an editor's hunch that there are a large
number of readers out there who live in perpetual breach of the tenth
commandment. They covet.
Their lives are lived resentful of other people getting stuff they aren't getting, and they are suckers for stories designed to foster righteous indignation.
Usually the story results form a tipoff. But this one was different. No one got a scoop. The Turnpike's PR man Dan Paradee wrote up a statement announcing the trip to IBTTA in Vienna Austria and gave it to local media and the AP:
Maine Turnpike Officials to Participate in
International Tolling Conference
"PORTLAND--Two Maine Turnpike executives and three members of the Board of Directors will meet with toll facility owners and operators from around the world at the annual meeting of the International Bridge Tunnel and Turnpike Association (IBTTA) in Vienna, Austria next week. The conference will bring together toll industry innovators to discuss and share information about the future...
Download the full Paradee statement here as MSWord doc.
The AP report was straight and fair. Main points:
Two execs and three board members going to the IBTTA meeting in Vienna.
Cost estimated at $26k, $5,200 each.
Quoted Paul Violette touting benefits of attending IBTTA, how it helped with improving toll technology, ET, ORT etc. Electronic tolling had saved 200k toll collector hours/year.
Background on IBTTA, every 4th conference is overseas.
Fuss last year over a $149/person for Turnpike people paid for by a consultant.
The Kennebec Journal was a little tougher. They quoted critics. A pol
Richard Cebra growled: "I think we should be focusing on maintaining
our infrastructure and not taking trips to Austria. I think there's
better ways to spend $26,000."The chairman of the senate transportation committee Sen Dennis Damon called it "a little bit untimely" given discussion of tolls recently, but went on to defend professional conferences as "important" to attend.
"We are a global economy," he said. "Much of what we do and see is transferable back here and, to that extent, I can support it."
Another said the Turnpike authority is an independent agency which has to be trusted to spend its money wisely.
The Journal follows up with an editorial playing both sides of the street.
"That leadership at the turnpike authority is tone deaf is amply demonstrated by this trip. Just a year after the expensive dinner incident, did no one over there consider that a trip to Vienna - land of some very expensive pastry, we'd note - might cause a few raised eyebrows? Perhaps attendance at a conference on public relations for quasi-governmental agencies might also be in order."
Then they defended the conference: "That this trip is a junket and a
waste of taxpayers' money is not entirely true. A conference in Austria
is an expensive proposition... Five thousand dollars and change for
each attendee's trip cost seems high."Yet the turnpike authority's budget last year was $106 million, making this outlay just 0.0245 percent of the agency's annual spending.
"Furthermore, it isn't taxpayer money that supports the turnpike authority, it's toll-payer money (many toll-payers are, of course, Maine taxpayers). Almost 80 percent of the agency's income is from tolls; the remaining 20 percent comes from concession rentals on the turnpike.
"And ask almost anyone who goes to professional conferences: There are many things to be learned at them. Socializing, eating, touring - those are also part of a conference. But the meat of them is the exchange of important and timely information, which helps attendees do their jobs better when they get home."
Touchy feely stuff
Then they turned again: "And yet ... it still doesn't look or feel right. When the governor has asked state lawmakers to trim $10 million from the latest budget, when lowering taxes is going to take further painful cuts in state spending, the prospect of two state agency staffers and three board members getting on a plane to Europe for a conference rankles.
"We can see the argument for sending staff to Vienna. We can almost see the argument for sending a board member -- the turnpike authority's board members work hard and are deeply involved in the activities of an agency that spends more than a hundred million dollars a year."
Staff they could see should go and perhaps one board member but not three...
Now there's micromanagement for you.
HCTRA - another scandal that wasn'tAnd in Houston Mike Strech after being forced out as director of the Harris County Toll Road Authority in May this year for soliciting funds for the annual staff summer party from vendors has been vindicated - more or less. The county auditor found he did nothing illegal. Money raised - $170k over five years - was properly accounted for, and properly spent, and some was left unspent in a properly named bank account. Â
However county bosses thought the practice of soliciting vendors was "inappropriate" and showed "poor judgment" and the county auditor concurred. No more party at vendor expense at HCTRA. Strech went to the vendors in the first place he because he didn't want to hit up the toll road budget.
Only partying left is pay at the gate.
TOLLROADSnews 2007-10-05
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| MaineTpkVienna.doc | 67.5 KB |