Recovery Board Chairman: We Can’t Certify Jobs Data at Recovery.gov
EmailABC News’ Rick Klein reports: The chairman of the Obama administration’s Recovery Board is telling lawmakers that he can’t certify jobs data posted at the Recovery.gov Web site — and doesn’t have access to a “master list” of stimulus recipients that have neglected to report data. Earl Devaney, the chairman of the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, responded to questions posed by Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., late yesterday to say the board can’t vouch for the numbers submitted by recipients of stimulus funding. “Your letter specifically asks if I am able to certify that the number of jobs reported as created/saved on Recovery.gov is accurate and auditable. No, I am not able to make this certification,” Devaney wrote, in a letter provided to ABC News. Devaney rejected Issa’s suggestion that the site include a more prominent disclaimer, such as an asterisk or a footnote. He said the site already does mention in a note to users that “errors and omissions” are likely. Devaney said that while he can’t yet provide a list of all entities that were required to submit information but failed to do so, “I expect to have access to this data shortly.” He also said the board will seek to correct data that proves to be faulty, and is promising “increasingly higher levels of accuracy in the future.” The letter comes amid mounting criticism of stimulus figures that have been riddled with errors, undercutting the administration’s claims that stimulus dollars have helped “save or create” 1 million jobs. ABC News has reported in recent days that Recovery.gov lists scores of jobs and millions of dollars in spending in congressional districts that do not exist. Separately, the administration has slashed more than 60,000 jobs from its most recent report on the program, because the reporting outlets submitted “unrealistic data.” Issa, the ranking Republican on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said in a statement: “This just confirms what we already know, that [the] Administration cannot certify info on recovery.gov as accurate and auditable. The man charged with providing accountability for stimulus spending cannot verify the accuracy of the job reports that the Administration – filtered through [the Office of Management and Budget] – have provided him.” “It’s a startling admission that he hasn’t even been provided with a list of who should have reported, which means he can’t know who didn’t report, which just adds fuel to the argument that the whole effort at transparency has failed. The Administration has provided inaccurate data, missing data, data that might be missing but they don’t even know for sure.” The oversight panel is convening a hearing Thursday on stimulus job figures, with Devaney due to testify.
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Just think, this is the same political party and administration that thinks they are smarter than the american people and wnat to manage our lives.
Posted by: jamescbuilder | November 18, 2009, 6:10 am 6:10 am
Corruption. Deceit. Lies. Incompetence.
America, you’re getting the CHANGE YOU DESERVE. Enjoy!
Posted by: Mary | November 18, 2009, 6:51 am 6:51 am
The master list is probalby in the same place all the H1N1 vaccines are – Imaginary Island.
Posted by: Indie | November 18, 2009, 6:55 am 6:55 am
And the same people want to run our healthcare system? I think not.
Posted by: bct | November 18, 2009, 7:27 am 7:27 am
This is the same government that wants to manage our healthcare. Why does anyone trust anything coming out of Washington?
Posted by: Bob | November 18, 2009, 7:28 am 7:28 am
Clearly this is Sarah Palin’s fault. Or maybe Bush’s. Or, maybe even Glenn Beck’s.
Posted by: Chuck | November 18, 2009, 7:32 am 7:32 am
This administration can’t prove what it says, I’m shocked, appalled, flabergasted,
OK I guess I knew it all along but how often do you get to use flabergasted?
Posted by: hkdakota | November 18, 2009, 7:40 am 7:40 am
There should be some proud papa boasting going on at ABC. They appear to have recently given birth to a few reporters. Charlie and the other usual whiners are still around and not to happy. However, the air in the halls must seem fresher to those who want to do their jobs without Obama gazing.
Posted by: jerry | November 18, 2009, 7:46 am 7:46 am
These are the people we want to control
healthcare? Be afraid….be very afraid.
Posted by: wis134 | November 18, 2009, 7:57 am 7:57 am
I love the way we taxpayers actually fund these people to lie to and steal from us.
Posted by: Mitch | November 18, 2009, 8:00 am 8:00 am
Well…Congress should have easy access to a list of jobs that should NOT be saved by Stimulus Funds. And that is the list of personnel working for the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, and Recovery.gov. But then I would expect Devaney to then say he doesn’t have access to a list of employees working for the Board, doesn’t know how many work for Recovery.gov, and doesn’t know any employees. With the large numbers of unemployed, many of them well-educated and experienced, I say lay off all of the Board and Recovery.gov, and replace them with competent workers. These new workers will appreciate the jobs, be more motivated to do well, and have a shining example of what will happen if they fail at the job too.
Posted by: Terrence O'Day | November 18, 2009, 8:04 am 8:04 am
It is what it is, folks. A good 55% of us know we’re being lied to and will likely not vote democratic in 2010 and perhaps even 2012 now. Sad how elected officials forget they’re not royalty in this country…that they can be replaced in the next election. They spend all that time and money to get elected and then they insulate themselves from public opinion and get arrogant.
Posted by: Rob | November 18, 2009, 8:07 am 8:07 am
And We STILL Have to Pay 900 Billion for this??? We have “The League of Debtors” running Our Nation and throwing Money around like a Hooker on Her Sugar Daddies’ PayDay.
Posted by: MPass86 | November 18, 2009, 8:09 am 8:09 am
Good reporting…, as many states have not used the stimulus money for job stimulation and the money is just sitting static waiting for God knows what. This money must be released to stimulate jobs. Team Obama must put pressure on these states. People need jobs.
Posted by: Angellight | November 18, 2009, 8:16 am 8:16 am
I have a recovery plan for you:
1) Reduce the taxes on business so they can hire more people.
2) Reduce the taxes on the American people so they can purchase more goods and services; thus expanding businesses, allowing them to hire more people.
3) Reduce the size of the massively bloated federal government, so that the taxes aren’t needed.
This works every time. However, we see the opposite in Washington. There is no real concern from President Obama about job losses. That is why he said he wasn’t concerned when the stock market took a severe dive. He said it was like watching a political poll, and that he didn’t pay any attention to it. He didn’t care that the life savings and retirement of millions of Americans were evaporating. Why is he only consumed by health care, when the immediate crisis areas in our nation are jobs (10.2% unemployment)and a crappy economy? He is consumed by the idea of expanding governments role in holding power over people. Whoever controls a person’s health, controls that person. Make no mistake. This is about power and control, not so much about health care. That is why there is no tort reform in any of the bills in Washington. The CBO says that it would save Americans $54 billion in health care costs, and that it would not cost a dime to implement. Washington isn’t interested in the idea, because there is nothing in it for Washington. There would be no growth in government and no need for more taxes. Only the American people would benefit. This is sickening.
Posted by: Rob | November 18, 2009, 8:18 am 8:18 am
I have a recovery plan for you:
1) Reduce the taxes on business so they can hire more people.
2) Reduce the taxes on the American people so they can purchase more goods and services; thus expanding businesses, allowing them to hire more people.
3) Reduce the size of the massively bloated federal government, so that the taxes aren’t needed.
This works every time. However, we see the opposite in Washington. There is no real concern from President Obama about job losses. That is why he said he wasn’t concerned when the stock market took a severe dive. He said it was like watching a political poll, and that he didn’t pay any attention to it. He didn’t care that the life savings and retirement of millions of Americans were evaporating. Why is he only consumed by health care, when the immediate crisis areas in our nation are jobs (10.2% unemployment)and a crappy economy? He is consumed by the idea of expanding governments role in holding power over people. Whoever controls a person’s health, controls that person. Make no mistake. This is about power and control, not so much about health care. That is why there is no tort reform in any of the bills in Washington. The CBO says that it would save Americans $54 billion in health care costs, and that it would not cost a dime to implement. Washington isn’t interested in the idea, because there is nothing in it for Washington. There would be no growth in government and no need for more taxes. Only the American people would benefit. This is sickening.
Posted by: Rob | Nov 18, 2009 8:18:51 AM
Rob, now you know this plan you have posted makes ENTIRELY too much sense. The goal is to keep the public confused so they don’t know what’s happening to them until it’s too late.
Shame on you for using your head and making things so simple. LOL
Posted by: Shoe | November 18, 2009, 8:24 am 8:24 am
Where are all the libs today? It seems like they have all left the building. Is it that they are giving up on their almighty savior BO?
Posted by: JJJ | November 18, 2009, 8:25 am 8:25 am
To all of the Hard Working Americans who have to pay taxes:
When are you going to wake up to this daily bull and do something about it.
I am very tired of paying for people who choose to do absolutely no work but get a check for health care, housing, food, electric bills, child care etc.
People need to take responsibility for the choices they make or suffer the consequences.
It all starts with Public Education as children learn all about the option in their lives to come if they study or live in poverty or find that dream job of selling drugs or belonging to a gang.
I think it is time to require every Congressman or woman to become a substitute teacher in their Congresional district for four school days a year. They need to see it and do it to understand the true failures of our public schools. A good student who wants to learn will learn even with a bad teacher because they have a will and goals not to live the lives their parents have by making excuses everyday on how they have been discriminated against all of their lives, why do black children punish the other black children in school who want to have good grades and go to college. This does not make sense. We do not need transparency, we need accountability from our Congressman and in order to get that they need to work at least four school days a year, they will be working I promise.
Please help me get this project off the ground if you truly believe in holding these politicians accounatble.
wolf
Posted by: Wolfgang Halbig | November 18, 2009, 8:26 am 8:26 am
And we are going to trust the government with our HealthCare.
Posted by: Chuck K | November 18, 2009, 8:30 am 8:30 am
A state of the art, gazillion dollar web site that does….nothing. I don’t like the term hope but at least there are a couple of Democrats stepping up and doing the right thing.
Posted by: david | November 18, 2009, 8:31 am 8:31 am
HELLO LIBS, COME IN LIBS, WE CANT HEAR YOU????? I wonder where they all are?
Posted by: sammy | November 18, 2009, 8:36 am 8:36 am
Tax breaks for the wealthy so they will hire more people than they need. Wait! We already tried that and that’s why the country is in trouble.
Posted by: rightbehind | November 18, 2009, 8:42 am 8:42 am
I have to add this. I just watch Biden spinning “they didn’t know which district they were in”. Here are people, getting grants and stimulus funds and I assume they have to submit some sort of application for yet they don’t know where they reside? They are smart enough to fill out the forms but not smart enough to goggle their location for a congressional district?
Come on Joe!!
Posted by: david | November 18, 2009, 8:53 am 8:53 am
Jobs have undoubtedly been saved or created through the stimulus spending.
However, it is just about impossible to come up with an accurate, uniform, and easily applied methodology to determine exactly how many jobs have been saved or created. Has it been worth the enormous cost? Independent analysts and economists probably won’t be able to answer this question until we approach the end of Obama’s first term (note: I did not vote for him).
Posted by: Stu | November 18, 2009, 9:03 am 9:03 am
LIARS every one of them! We have been taken for a ride and now they want to do it again.
You cannot afford to sit on the sidelines anymore, GET INVOLVED!
Posted by: indymind | November 18, 2009, 9:30 am 9:30 am
This program was never bonified anyway.
There was and is no way to verify any data.
So how Obama kept touting certain numbers is asinine…
And now it just proves, that Obama is lying to the american people.
Joe Wilson said it best…
Obama…YOU LIE
Posted by: more fail | November 18, 2009, 9:47 am 9:47 am
Can anyone in the Obama administration spell “INCOMPETENT” ??? probably NOT
Posted by: lovingpolitics | November 18, 2009, 9:48 am 9:48 am
All you have to do is put the word Beta up at the top of the Home page and keep it that way for the next 3 years and then no one will expect the numbers are correct. Many companies have done this to offer the product but not have the prolems of customer support. After all why would any of the numbers the govt puts out be reliable. And people want them to run our healthcare. That’s funny.
Posted by: jschmidt | November 18, 2009, 10:01 am 10:01 am
this just makes me ill. I was laid off last week and now i am being lied to…ugh. Thanks Mr. Obama…i appreciate being lied to and unemployed.
Posted by: melody | November 18, 2009, 10:08 am 10:08 am
New healthcare bill will cost over $1.2T. Odd that the biggest critic of the cost is the Chinese govt?
Posted by: deanbob | November 18, 2009, 10:13 am 10:13 am
The national debt is over $12T (trillion); but the unfunded liabilities of the govt is over $105 T. How is this going to be paid? By spending more? SURE! And I have the London Bridge I’d like to sell you …. cheap.
Posted by: deanbob | November 18, 2009, 10:17 am 10:17 am
If Washington was serious about saving money on healthcare, they will/would (at a minimum) include medical mal-practice reform. According to USDEBTCLOCK.COM the unfunded liabilities number is over 106T.
Posted by: deanbob | November 18, 2009, 10:23 am 10:23 am
Hey, I have an idea. Let’s let a government that doesn’t seem to realize there is only 435 Congressional districts manage our health care. What could possibly go wrong? After all, the stimulus has been such a smashing success, right?
The Obama Record: Record unemployment, record deficits, no legislative accomplishments.
Posted by: ObamaisCarter | November 18, 2009, 10:43 am 10:43 am
ohbummer.
Posted by: gatorsnc | November 18, 2009, 10:43 am 10:43 am
Well is anyone surprised that the government can’t certify any of the information. Look at all the waste and fraud in Medicare and Medicad that Congress knows about but can’t fig out how to stop, and all the waste and fraud in all the other federal programs. These are the people who are telling us that they can give us Health Reform and save money. Government doesn’t know how to save money they only know how to spent and waste money.
Posted by: jsietz1 | November 18, 2009, 11:05 am 11:05 am
It’s all a load of shlock. The real question is, where did all of that money go?
Almost one trillion dollars of taxpayer money. It’s an emergency! We must have it to put out our financial fires or all will be lost!
It’s like firemen calling for help…Only now, cannot recall where in the hell that fire was!
WE know where it went. It paid for pet budgets of the Administration’s supporters. Funded the wish lists of every twit that needed five bucks, across the nation. It was never about jobs. It was never about the economy.
12 trillion dollars of debt and climbing. Double digit REPORTED unemployment (not adjusted for those who’ve given up or are underemployed).
Recovery.gov….fake platitudes for the math challenged and unscrupulous. Nice.
Posted by: JR | November 18, 2009, 11:09 am 11:09 am
Good Morning America!
Welcome to reality! Reality is the government believes it knows best on everything in your life. Reality is the government is trying to control every aspect of even your private life. Reality is… the government can’t keep up with its own work, much less tell over 200 million Americans how to run their own lives.
America, PLEASE wake up, ignore party affiliation and vote for candidates that will uphold our contstitution rather than empower themselves to control us.
Thank you ABC for opening one eye from your Obama stupor-slumber!
Posted by: Eric Potter MD | November 18, 2009, 11:15 am 11:15 am
The new POTUS and his “advisers” made a big mistake on formulating a stimulus to our economy in the first place. Why in hell we bail out banks, car manufacturers, blah, blah, blah in the first place boggles the mind. There are two basic ingredients to an economy…people and jobs. Every day I walk through a park which was a WPA project in the 30′s. Where is the action today….nowhere that I can see.
I am not talking about “green” here…I am talking about putting people to work…screw the healthcare opus Congress is attempting to write for legacy purposes….PEOPLE ARE OUT OF JOBS….HELP THEM….this administration is either naive or simply stupid. “Create or SAVE jobs?” Give me a break. Jobs Saved? Sure, school teachers in districts sorely out of cash to pay them; conversely, the much heralded job savings at Catepillar…perhaps not all we were told it would be by the politicos.Jobs Created…..I dunno….still looking for that one American.
Posted by: justj joey | November 18, 2009, 11:20 am 11:20 am
Lets face it, with no accountability this sight is completely worthless. What a joke and what a waste of money.
Posted by: Phil | November 18, 2009, 11:36 am 11:36 am
Wasn’t Biden supposed to be in charge of the stimulus money? Why isn’t he being held to task for all these errors? If this administration can’t even get the numbers right on their $18million website, how can we trust them to do anything right? Obviously, we can’t. This administration is more corrupt and deceitful than any prior adminstration.
Posted by: grannysunni | November 18, 2009, 12:10 pm 12:10 pm
Oh where Oh where are the Obama backers ? ..What have you got to say about this ? ..Do you still follow Obama and the nuts and his peacock family …God knows there’s some that still do .No matter what this man does to this country ..
Posted by: candobetter | November 18, 2009, 12:10 pm 12:10 pm
Most of these grants were given to states with shovel ready projects….So more than likely with so many Republican governors, the money was siphoned into the state’s general funds….so much for trusting state and local governments
Posted by: George D | November 18, 2009, 12:22 pm 12:22 pm
Why wasn’t this web site fed directly from the States? They are required to report the who/what/when/where/why of the spending of the TARP money. New Mexico had to hire an ex-governor at 6 figure salary to track this crap. Let’s get rid of the multi layers of non-performing personnel and hold someone accountable. No more I don’t have access….That’s as bad as “I can’t recall”!
Posted by: Ken | November 18, 2009, 12:32 pm 12:32 pm
George D- It is not the states run by Republicans that are in most trouble. It is the ones run by Dems. Waterbury,Ct- created a $75K job to follow the stimulus money and it was given to a Dem Alderman (councilman or slectmen). How many other jobs are just created to follow the stimulus money, or to build websites to follow the money. What a waste. Instead of creating long term jobs this creates short term jobs that end when the money ends. CT has a Republican governor but the Dems control the legislature overwhelmingly. Two months into the new budget year and we are already $300 million plus in the hole. The Dems can’t make the hard decisions to cut budgets, think that we can always pay more taxes, and don’t know how to help buinsess create long term jobs. In the past several years, govt has increased employment by large numbers resulting in higher taxes and more deficits. Govt employment does not make a productive economy.
Posted by: jschmidt | November 18, 2009, 12:35 pm 12:35 pm
Hope, that’s all there’s left of this bankrupt, fraudulent, and incompetant administration. Obama is all hat and no cattle.
Posted by: laura henning | November 18, 2009, 12:48 pm 12:48 pm
Now they want another job bill to create jobs? where are the 3-4 million jobs Obama promised,from the first stimulis? Trust this administration to RUIN your health care, They can not even get the figures correct on what jobs they are suppose to be creating.Smoke and Mirrors,along with lies and inuendos.
Posted by: strikerF | November 18, 2009, 1:28 pm 1:28 pm
If this does not prove to some of you how much these guys will lie to hold power then I pity you when its your turn to ask for help to eat or pay your bills. The help will be gone because the rest of us will be all tapped out paying 60% taxes and trying to survive with whats left.
Posted by: Jim Rod | November 18, 2009, 1:44 pm 1:44 pm
What are his credentials that he was given this position? I criticized Bush, and rightly so for putting a show horse handler in charge of FEMA, I am wondering if this is cronyism as well? This website cost 17 million!!!! This guy looks over fed and lazy, typical government employee!
Posted by: Hege1321 | November 18, 2009, 2:30 pm 2:30 pm
This adminstration seems to a serious problem with backing up the numbers they pull out of a hat.
Of course when you “create” a statistical category that does NOT exist, and has NO practical way of even being reported.
All this and more from the flaming “experts” of this childish administration. the list just keeps growing!
Posted by: Mike_C | November 18, 2009, 2:40 pm 2:40 pm
That’s OK.
In light of all we have found out about Acorn and thier activities in the election…we can’t really certify that either.
No big deal. Just throw tens of millions more at another Dem crony to build a “more accurate and transparent website”.
Or just accuse anyone who disagrees with the administration with the racism charge. Has worked like a charm so far.
Posted by: Gibberish | November 18, 2009, 3:00 pm 3:00 pm
Where’s my flyin’ EAA.
Posted by: Team O' | November 18, 2009, 3:47 pm 3:47 pm
Secret combinations! These people think they have immunity from the things they do, that they have free reign so what need would there be to keep a paper trail or be organized? If they did this it would incriminate them. These people are bad news!
Posted by: mark | November 18, 2009, 7:34 pm 7:34 pm
The problem here is people think Republicans and dem’s are two separate parties! Wake up people this is the reason why our freedoms are at risk because people are not aware of the corruption in the government and think voting republican over dem’s will save us. News flash people, rep’s and dem’s are controlled by the same people and behind the sceen they have the same agenda, on tv they appear to be against each other. Builderbergs, trilateral commission and Council on Foreign Relations these are the 3 big players. Research them and get familiar with who they are and what their agendas are. Know your enemies!
Posted by: mark | November 18, 2009, 7:48 pm 7:48 pm
I can’t help but laugh at this. This is the hope and change we are getting. I guess we can still hope the health care bill goes away.
Posted by: busfreak | November 18, 2009, 8:22 pm 8:22 pm
Looks like Obama keeping two sets of books? They set up this phoney websites like Recovery.gov to show the People where their money went on the Stimulus, but the numbers aren’t real (this is the phoney set of books). Who is keeping the real set? Now they’re trying to blame it on the people who gave them the figures.
This is the Obama way: keep blaming someone else. Even Eric Holder tried to get us to believe that he didn’t consult with Obama regarding bringing the terroists to NYC to be tried. Yeah, right. When you add it up, Obama doesn’t seem to talk to anyone and he never knows anything about anything.
Posted by: Harlo | November 18, 2009, 8:50 pm 8:50 pm
It cost $18 nmillion to update the website, but WHAT DID THE WEBSITE ORIGINALLY COST?
I think this one falls under WASTE, FRAUD AND ABUSE!
Posted by: Ed Taylor | November 18, 2009, 11:05 pm 11:05 pm
Bogus and unverifiable jobs saved/created numbers.
For the bozos in the White House, who are passionate about going Green, they probably didn’t even bother to track how many of these BOGUS jobs saved/created were Green jobs.
$787B is roughly 25% of our Federal budget. They spent these printed money so the unemployment would not go above 8%. The money is gone and the unemployment is 10.2% and still climbing up.
Bush+Obama gave $700B for the Wall Street bailout. The crooks who are responsible for our current economic crisis were made whole with the HOPE that credits to the business and people will flow. The crooks are holding the credit money very tightly, except to pay for their Bonuses.
If the Health Care reforms being debated in the Congress becomes reality, expect the same EXPERT management for another $2.3 Trillions for your good care.
Posted by: harry | November 19, 2009, 12:48 am 12:48 am
Thanks for the post and for sharing the very resourceful post here.
Posted by: Tag44 | November 19, 2009, 6:09 am 6:09 am