NOAA comes under criticism again, this time over National Weather Service funding
By DON CUDDY June 05, 2012 12:00 AM
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and its embattled head Dr. Jane Lubchenco are again the target of criticism after the director of the National Weather Service, Jack Hayes, resigned abruptly on Memorial Day weekend.
An environmental watchdog group, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), informed the Washington Post when it learned that Hayes had been replaced and the story has since been widely reported.
An internal investigation has uncovered ongoing financial irregularities at the weather service, according to a NOAA memo. In fiscal 2012 alone, up to $35 million may have been “reprogrammed,” the term employed by NOAA to describe what has taken place, the memo said.
“This is a case of robbing Peter to pay Paul,” said Jeff Ruch, executive director of PEER, a national organization of federal, state and local employees who work in the environmental field. Structural deficits were built into the National Weather Service budget according to Ruch. “They were using appropriated funds to backfill general operations in a sort of budgetary Ponzi scheme,” he said.
A 60-page report produced by NOAA found that, for at least the past two years, the agency has been shifting appropriated funds from a number of its designated programs and using them to cover other expenses and to help avoid employee furloughs, according to Ruch.
Using appropriated funds for any purpose other than what is intended is a violation of the Anti Deficiency Act and that is a crime, he said.
Full story here
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According to credible sources, the scuttlebutt is that NOAA may be forced to put up to 5000 employees on a two week furlough, and that there are expectations of charges being filed.
At the National Weather Service Employees Organization website, they say that
NOAA Leadership’s Mismanagement of Funds
Results in Furloughs of all NWS Agency Employees
(June 7, 2012) The National Weather Service has proposed to furlough all agency employees for 13 working days in FY 2012 due to a $26 million dollar budget shortfall. The NWS notified NWSEO today about the furloughs and included a Reprogramming Fact Sheet. From that sheet:
As a result of a recent investigation, the Department determined that there were insufficient funds in the Local Warnings and Forecast program to fully pay all labor costs for National Weather Service (NWS) employees in FY 2012. The Administration’s plan is to avoid furloughs of National Weather Service employees, which could cause significant impact to forecast and warning operations. As a result, the Department of Commerce has submitted a reprogramming package to reprogram funds within NOAA to support ongoing weather forecasting operations at NWS. In order to provide the NWS with the appropriate amount of time to plan its operations for the remainder of the year, the Administration will work with Congress with a goal of executing the reprogramming before July 1 that would cover operations and avoid furloughs.
There’s no mention of taking funds away from climate programs ($346 million FY2012). Given a choice between climate and forecast/warnings programs, I’ll take forecast/warnings programs every day of the week and twice on Sunday, and I’ll bet the public will too.
They go on to say:
“National Weather Service employees are paying for the mistakes of the agency’s leadership,” said NWSEO President Dan Sobien. “Their misguided plan to furlough all agency employees is another example of the short-sighted thinking that has put them in such dire straits.” (More)
This looks really bad, it appears they have a real mess on their hands. PEER is getting involved too, saying:
“NOAA should not be allowed to self-investigate and exonerate its political leadership,” stated PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch, pointing out union claims that budget juggling was needed to avoid needless furloughs of NWS employees. “We do not know whether faithful public servants are being scapegoated to divert attention from colossally dysfunctional management.”
And then there’s the internal investigative report they won’t release citing “privacy concerns”. Sound familiar? Maybe they can get advice from the Pacific Institute on how to CYA while withholding reports the public wants to see.
– Anthony
Larry Ledwick (hotrod ) says:
June 7, 2012 at 6:24 pm
Large organizations act very much like primitive organisms, their primary drives are to grow and gain control and dominance over their territory.
Larry
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Yet, we like to think otherwise.
At our peril.
Ha…..this is nothing compared to the financial irregularities NOAA and NWS did when they were setting up Doppler Radar……………
“…Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), informed the Washington Post when it learned that Hayes had been replaced…”
I think I’m with DesertYote here. Isn’t the Washington (Com)Post about the last place on the planet you would report a real problem???To me, “Environmental Responsibility” should mean cutting wasteful agencies such as EPA. NOAA Climate Arm, etc.not reporting yet another lefty scam to yet another NYT clone! Who/what is PEER? What credentials do they have?
This is a clear violation of the law and should be prosecuted. I’m sure that Eric Holder will get right on it… right after he finishes prosecuting the New Black Panther members that put a bounty on George Zimmerman, clears up that Fast and Furious mess, and identifies/prosecutes the administration officials that having been leaking sensitive intelligence info to the press.
On second thought, maybe he won’t get around to it… especially if the funding was needed to cover the cost of global warming research done at the behest of the administration.
There hasn’t been an approved Federal budget in three years so I’d have to say that I’m not surprised to see this happen… and it’s probably just the tip of a very large iceberg.
Guys, I don’t know the entire story either but…money can be legally reprogrammed. It takes permission from DC and coordination with Congressional representatives but it can be done and actually it’s not particularily uncommon.
Whatever happened to “adult supervision” of major government agencies? Everywhere you look these days you see things that leave you wondering, “Is anyone minding the store?” In this case, it would appear certain children allocated too much money to shiny bells and whistles for the wagon and not enough to buy four wheels. Unfortunately for those expecting to ride that wagon, it ain’t legal to spend whistle money on wheels. Oops!
Might be an honest request for an audit–might be a shakedown of an agency that didn’t fund their agenda:
http://peer.org/
Their legal arm:
Maybe time will tell.
I am certainly no supporter of the AGW nonsense, and I consider the money spent on could be put to a far better use in my fire-pit. I must say though that Jane Lubchenco has been a real leader on fisheries issues, and has been the best NOAA Administrator in my 30 years in the seafood business. She understands the biology and the economics, and the real (not the watermelon) environmental concerns. She realizes that these three aspects of fishery management do not have to work at cross purposes. She has had the courage to take the right position, even when that position was not popular.
If she is forced out, I Hope the Romney brings her back (after Anthony Re-Programs her re AGW)
Expect more of this as entitlement programs take more and more of the tax coming into the US house of cards. Year by year there will be fewer people paying taxes and those that do, in the short run, will pay more. That won’t be enough. People find ways of shifting income such that the IRS only gets about 18%. Interest on the national debt is low. This won’t last either. Borrowing costs will go up and interest will take a bigger share. Because of the entitlement burden, it is projected that by 2025 the US will have to borrow to do the things one expects the government to do. From the WSJ:
“Forget about building roads and funding scientific research. The entire defense budget would be deficit-financed.”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303830204577448483262804106.html?KEYWORDS=interest+on+debt
The budgets of all agencies will feel this squeeze and compensatory (backfilling Ponzi schemes or whatever) adjustments adopted. States have already tried furloughs, IOUs instead of paying vendors, delayed payments into the next budget cycle, and other means of kicking the can down the highway. Surely the NWS isn’t the only agency trying to “make do.”
There is also too much of this sort of waste:
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Global-News/2012/0606/USAID-cuts-funding-for-Elmo-on-Pakistan-TV
American taxes going to put Sesame Street on Pakistani TV and now investigating fraud and corruption.
US spending is out of control. The WSJ calls the coming crisis the most predictable in history.
It should come as no surprise that there are a lot of government workers making six figure salaries but who do virtually no work. Would anyone here like to make $130,000 per year with great benefits and pension simply for showing up every day? This is how our government works. It’s unfortunate.
Do you people have any reading comprehension skills? They said: “The Administration’s plan is to avoid furloughs of National Weather Service employees, which could cause significant impact to forecast and warning operations.”
My understanding is that funds designated for other programs were used to pay for forecast and warning operations which would be the most responsible thing to do. Knee jerk much?
Uh, yes, maybe and No!
What you’ve stated is technically correct. As far as it goes, but the devil is in the details.
People often thinks funds are all inclusive, but in a Federal budget, there are specific categories of funds (capital – physical long term property, operating expenses, revenue – if any, etc…) along with specific fiscal years budgets are allocated for. For example, line item expense funds may be moved from one accounting line to another or between office finance numbers with proper authorization. Moving the same accounting funds from one part of the year to another is harder to get authorization for, but still within the realm of possibility. Moving funds from one fiscal year to another is a definite no-no, as Federal budgets are zero based every year.
Another funds item area that are definite no-nos are moving funds from capital expenditure plans (say, building retrofit construction) and moving those funds to expense line items. Breaking this rule, at the minimum, sends the worker packing, or prosecution. Prosecution is generally serious only if the employee or anyone they associate with (friends, family, relatives) directly profits from the mishandling of the monies.
Spending next years money is also a very bad thing to try and do. Normally, I’d say that kind of action gets one demoted or fired. $35 million of wrongdoing is another matter entirely. Congress can sure scrap up a lot of hot coals to drag offenders of this magnitude over.
I only mention some of the possibilities, not all ways Federal budget money can be mishandled. There are many more. Nor do I have inside knowledge on exactly what mishandling took place. Given the Ponzi statement, I’d lean towards the spending money that isn’t available and then using next year’s funding to cover the, by then, overdue bills.
When this topic was initially broached, there were a fair few folks who implied that $35 million was chump change in the Federal budget. It might seem that way, but individual Federal employees are frequently micro-managed to assinine levels. (Excepting very senior officials, like maybe cabinent members. Then they’re only managed to assinine levels.)
Case in point; I directly observed a team of investigators spend two weeks trying balance an office budget. The office had an embezzling manager who had successfully hidden the embezzlement for almost two years. The investigators had the vast majority of the funds worked out within days; they spent the rest of the two weeks trying fo find where odd cents went to. Literally, approximately 8 workers spent ten days trying to identify lost nickels and quarters! When I asked why, they told me that if they couldn’t absolutely balance the numbers, they could expect trouble from their boss who assumes they missed fund mishandling errors then.
Another case in point; one agency was trying to bring in modern GAAP accounting so they could install a modern accounting software package. Part of their initial investigation, conducted by expensive contractors, was following and verifying are travel vouchers for six months. They found that the cost to properly verify travel voucers for that period was $300,000. The contracting team identified $50,000 in travel errors, against the agency; meaning the employees were not cheating on their travel vouchers and the agency owed them the $50,000. The employees were so afraid of being accused of travel fraud that they always erred in favor of the agency. The upshot of the executives meeting this was announced at, they wanted to continue spending the $300,000 ($600,00 annually) verifying travel vouchers. It was one of the few times I saw high priced accounting contractors sit down and hold their heads in their hands. It took two more days for the contractors to explain to the managers how the accounting software would handle the vouchers, before they agreed to stop the new verification process. Some of the older managers were still shaking their heads because they thought it was a big mistake to stop what was obviously making their accuracy better.
That may be true from where you view the situation, but I couldn’t disagree more. First, no one likes having something shoved down their throats and Lubchenko’s catch shares policy was rammed down everyone’s throat but the very large commercial fishing fleet. The approval process was rammed through and all dissenting opinions ignored. After all, if PEW and the Environmental Defense Fund want it, that is good enough for Lubchenko and Obama.
After two years, the Gulf of Maine commercially valuable fish stocks have been decimated. A fishery that too many years of reduced seasons and catches for the recreational fishermen and smaller near shore commercial fishing fleet has been ruined within approximately 18 months.
See: http://www.outdoorhub.com/news/rfa-blasts-environmental-defense-fund-fish-fraud/ or any news source you prefer. This matter has become so serious, that Congress is looking to defund Lubchenko and Obama’s catch share actions. Obama wrote a presidential order recently to institute catche share nationally; after both houses of Congress nixed the catch shares bill. Nothing like a little dictatorship when you’re not getting your way.
After the wonderful almost two years of fresh fish abundance you may have seen in the seafood business, you can look forward to many years of a seafood lack because of this greedy shortsightedness. Oh, but then you’ll only charge more because the price of fish will go up. Not to mention that many people who would pay to fish on a charter boat so they could afford some decent fish and get enjoyment of catching their fish, always better that choosing at the deli, will not catch many fish now. The whole salt water fishing business from tackle stores to high end boat builders will suffer.
As far as I care, Lubchenko can ! That is one ugly thought I and so many anglers have of her.
It’s the fault of the accountants and finance directors who didn’t crunch the numbers on the budget and didn’t track the budget to know there were over runs. Had they done so, they could have gone back to Congress and corrected the budget. Congress would have approved as the NWS is a very important service. I can think of only a few reasons why they would just move the money: Their egos wouldn’t let them admit the mistake or they didn’t want to answer questions about why they were so far off. It will be interesting to see if NWS money was moved to another project prior to the shortfall.
O/T, but interesting: http://news.yahoo.com/warmest-u-spring-record-noaa-204427303.html
“This warmth is an example of what we would expect to see more often in a warming world”.
Quite so.
Bureaucrats are never fired for mismanagement of money, no matter what the official notice says. Money is always mismanaged. That’s the exact purpose of a bureaucracy, for heaven’s sake.
Bureaucrats are only fired for insubordination or for threatening the power of their immediate boss. It would be interesting to find out which of those causes is involved here, especially if the insubordination was caused by Gaian heresy.
Federal Government … Too Big To Succeed
(Can’t take credit. Someone else thought that up!)
The financial handbook of Illinois mismanagement is seeping into all corners of the country now, like a evil, dark shadow creeping across the land.
Legal reprogramming. California, 1970’s, a squeak of terminal mediocrity of and by elected and appointed management. Department appoints, also sometimes called civil service promotion. The term – Creative Financing is the art of budgetary movement of funds to fill gaps. The bottom line is the only limiting factor. Ponzi is terminal mediocrity of what has become the norm of the states.
Federal High Trust Fund, California, is conveniently deposited in the state general fund. The Fed’s by nary a word have approved this ponzi. Spend it on the pressing social issues and replace the spent dedicated highway dollars as revenue re-generates itself. Ponzi. Why should highway trust funds sit idle for 6months waiting for the project to begin, those Creative managers have said.
NOAA during the 80-90’s, in some part, was creatively financed by the Department of Defense. Secret stuff, providing the shuffling and or retrieval of underwater devises for data utilization in the Nuke submarine needs. Like the sea water temperatures, classified and necessary for stealth maneuvering, that also could be used in part by NOAA. Department of Defense paid NOAA for their boat and crew. Cost? Cost plus 10 percent? Navy does not have ships that do this work?
pdxrod says:
June 8, 2012 at 3:05 am
O/T, but interesting: http://news.yahoo.com/warmest-u-spring-record-noaa-204427303.html
“This warmth is an example of what we would expect to see more often in a warming world”.
Quite so.
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HUH?!?
It has been freezing COLD here in NC. 2004 had 17 days over 90F and 2 of those were 98F. This May we had ONE day over 90F and that was 91F, the rest were mainly in the 70’s and low 80’s. People here on WUWT are saying the same for Oregon too. (It just snowed)
This is what is actually happening to the “weather”
3 graphs of US temperature from 1980, 1987and 2007: http://jonova.s3.amazonaws.com/graphs/giss/hansen-giss-1940-1980.gif
Difference between Adjusted and Raw data for years 1900 -1999: http://cdiac.ornl.gov/epubs/ndp/ushcn/ts.ushcn_anom25_diffs_urb-raw_pg.gif
And a flick graph showing more fiddling since 1998: http://stevengoddard.files.wordpress.com/2010/10/1998changesannotated.gif?w=500&h=355
Sooner or later ordinary people, especially farmers are going to realize that the MSM is pedaling a crock of Fertilizer and so is NOAA…. Oh wait they already have. 69% [of Americans] Say It’s Likely Scientists Have Falsified Global Warming Research and 75% Say U.S. Not Doing Enough To Develop Its Gas And Oil Resources
Seeing how they are all getting their ethics platform from P. Gleick’s and Pacific Institute, I would think they feel quite immune from oversight. It will take prison terms to reverse the mind-set of these people. Better sooner than later, but an example must be set. GK
I’d be leery of regarding PEER as ‘on the side of the angels’.
IIRC, they’re aggressively defending the ‘scientist’ who started the ‘polar bear extinction’ scare (based on 3 dead bears glimpsed from a airplane) who now controls $50 million in grants!
This was embezzlement, plain and simple on a grand scale.
The arrogance and deceptive language the guitly use to defend this is disgusting.
Beware, many govt bureaucrats and politicians know that the most effective pressure point for increasing funding and/or averting budget cuts is to say that a program the public most wants or needs is in peril of cutbacks. Why trim real fat or “sacred cows” when you can get people worried about their weather forecasting (or in local govt cases fire and police services etc.)??
It’s cynical, dishonest, but too often effective….
“furlough all agency employees for 13 working days in FY 2012 due to a $26 million dollar budget shortfall.”
2 million a day! With all this “weathermania” I’m sure we could at least cut it in half. I believe they could, without losing anything cut the climatology personnel at Universities in half, too. A freind of mine teaches geology and he says that over half of the students are going into the “environmental” options. These make-work programs have cost us a trillion or so over the past 20 years.