I had some discussion with Sean Cockerham of the Anchorage Daily News about problems with the Office of the Governor’s spreadsheet. Now he’s posted a story in which Linda Perez has admitted that the spreadsheet has some faulty figures:
The administrative director in the governor’s office, Linda Perez, conceded that some costs were counted twice and said “the total cost is overstated by $26,849.” She said she missed that the Department of Law’s updated numbers included costs that were already counted.
“It was my error…mea culpa,” said Perez, who has worked for governors of both parties since the 1980s. [Ref #1]
There are bunch of other problems that are also noted in Sean’s report, which Perez is going to look into. But read the full story — which I’m happy to report also acknowledges the work I’ve been doing on this. (Along with that of Mako Yamakura, a blogger with the Detroit News, who I’m unfamiliar with.)
Okay, Mel: bed!
Related posts
There’s several of them: follow the tag Palin ethics complaints.
References
- 7/10/09. “It doesn’t all add up to $1.9 million” by Sean Cockerham (Anchorage Daily News, Alaska Politics blog)
good job, thank you!
Mel, you seriously have a cool site. I just stumbled upon the site, and didn’t realize the extent and grasp of the situation you obviously have. I just grabbed a beer and read the spreadsheet before my own post, and posted here and with Mr. C.
My condolences for you and your family.
cheers,
Mako Yamakura
Mel,
Since you seem to have Mr. Cockerham’s ear, perhaps some questions regarding why there are expenses listed, but no income regarding the records requests.
The fees charged both during and since the VP run have been exorbitant and should certainly cover a good portion of the “expenses” incurred. I suspect that the IT Dept expenditures were for the records requests and according to the correspondence with Celtic Diva, those costs are ALL borne by the person requesting the records.
If they are going to count those expenses in the spreadsheet, they should also be offsetting them with the income being brought in by them.