ABC News Investigations of the Year: End of a Boondoggle
Feds kill million-dollar round-the-world junket, admit it was 'stupid spending.'
— -- This week, the Blotter is reprising seven different Brian Ross Unit investigations that made a difference in 2011. Today: A round-the-world trip for state and federal officials -- to look at billboards.
The federal highway program involved spending $1.2 million each year on globe-trotting trips for bureaucrats, including one 17-day journey that had transportation officials snapping photos of billboard advertisements on two continents.
In June, ABC News learned of the obscure government initiative, known as the International Scan Program. The stated purpose of the program was to study how other countries handled the challenges of running major highway networks. State and federal officials were to spend time exploring such issues as motorcycle safety, managing pavement, precast concrete, and adapting to climate change.
READ the original ABC News report on the billboard program.
WATCH the original ABC News report.
But ABC News found that federal and state transportation employees had for a decade been jetting off to popular foreign tourist destinations on the taxpayers' dime. When ABC News began asking questions, one group of transportation experts had just completed a nine city tour that took them to Australia, Sweden, the Netherlands, New Zealand, and Great Britain. The purpose of the trip? It was grist for a 76-page report about policies for dealing with billboard advertising.
It was the type of program that had already captured the attention of U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, who was feeling pressure from Congress and from President Obama to eliminate waste and scale back federal spending.
Impact: One day after ABC News began asking for LaHood's explanation about the International Scan Program, the U.S. Department of Transportation announced it had been suspended. In an email to ABC News, one of LaHood's aides said the secretary had already singled the program out for elimination because it was wasting taxpayer money.
"The president has been clear: We must get rid of stupid spending and pointless waste," LaHood said in his emailed statement. "Each taxpayer dollar is precious, and there is no excuse for wasting a single one. That's why ... I have suspended this program."
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