This is an absolute SLAP IN THE FACE to not only myself, but every other tax paying citizen in this country. Why can't WE as the public stand up and take action! There are more of US than there are of THEM. If this happens in FEMA, think about all the other outrageous waste the government uses with our tax money.
I am a middle class working mother. Every penny counts. For this to happen makes me doubt where our country is going and where the priorities lie for the politicians and all those involved. This has just gone beyond complete tolerance. Not only are we paying for this disaster, we are paying for all the Mexican immigrants who illegally enter our country, use our tax funded services, insist that we cater to them due to their lack of knowing the english language--what do we get in return? More taxes for us, and their contribution to crime in our society.
This is UNACCEPTABLE!
People, please make a stand, otherwise we are America's SLAVES.
People, please make a stand, otherwise we are America's SLAVES.
(AP) WASHINGTON - Houston divorce lawyer Mark Lipkin says he can't recall anyone paying for his services with a FEMA debit card, but congressional investigators say one of his clients did just that.
The $1,000 payment was just one example cited in an audit that concluded that up to $1.4 billion perhaps as much as 16 percent of the billions of dollars in assistance expended after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita was spent for bogus reasons.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency also was hoodwinked to pay for season football tickets, a tropical vacation and a sex change operation, the audit found.
Prison inmates, a supposed victim who used a New Orleans cemetery for a home address and a person who spent 70 days at a Hawaiian hotel all were able to get taxpayer help, according to evidence that gives a new black eye to the nation's disaster relief agency. "I do Katrina victims all the time," Lipkin, the divorce attorney, told The Associated Press. "I didn't know anybody did that with me. I don't think it's right, obviously."
Government Accountability Office officials were testifying before a House committee Wednesday on their findings. Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, chairman of the subcommittee overseeing an investigation of post-hurricane aid, called the bogus spending "an assault on the American taxpayer." "Prosecutors from the federal level down should be looking at prosecuting these crimes and putting the criminals who committed them in jail for a long time," he said.
FEMA said it has identified $16.8 million in improperly awarded disaster relief money and has started efforts to collect the money. The GAO said it was 95 percent confident that improper and potentially fraudulent payments were much higher between $600 million and $1.4 billion. The investigative agency said it found people lodged in hotels often were paid twice, since FEMA gave them individual rental assistance and paid hotels directly.
FEMA paid California hotels $8,000 to house one individual the same person who received three rental assistance payments for both disasters. In another instance, FEMA paid an individual $2,358 in rental assistance, while at the same time paying about $8,000 for the same person to stay 70 nights at more than $100 per night in a Hawaii hotel.
FEMA also could not establish that 750 debit cards worth $1.5 million even went to Katrina victims, the auditors said.
Among the items purchased with the cards:
- An all-inclusive, one-week Caribbean vacation in the Punta Cana resort in the Dominican Republic.
- Five season tickets to New Orleans Saints professional football games.
- Adult erotica products in Houston and "Girls Gone Wild" videos in Santa Monica, CA
- Dom Perignon champagne and other alcoholic beverages in San Antonio.
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