The good news:
Top highway officials said they stopped letting the road-building industry pay for their trips to meetings at luxury hotels in tourist hot spots — a change lawmakers and the state’s top ethics official applaud.The bad news:
Taxpayers now pick up the tabNot everyone can afford a Florida vacation this summer. But don't worry, some of your tax dollars are going to pay for MDOT officials to have their own Florida vacations.
A set of travel records the Sun Herald recently requested, from September 2008 until March, showed trips to Destin, Fla., for separate conferences — one by the MRBA and one by the American Council of Engineering Companies. Taxpayers covered the tab, which included rooms at top-drawer resort hotels.So what then is the alternative? Obviously, don't travel so much. In case they couldn't see it from their Jackson tower, there is a recession on and Mississippi families have to cut their vacation plans. Use the money on a road, not a road trip.
At one ACEC meeting in February 2009, Wayne Brown was reimbursed $385 for one night’s stay at the Ritz-Carlton in Pentagon City outside Washington. He also attended the Mississippi Asphalt Pavement Association meetings in Fairhope, Ala., in March 2009. Expense reports showed he paid $252.56 a night for the four nights he stayed there, with an overall tab of $1,165.
Wayne Brown, Minor and Hall attended meetings of the MRBA in Destin, Fla., paying $247 a night at the Sandestin Golf and Beach Resort. Wayne Brown stayed three nights, paying $866.41, Hall stayed three nights, paying $909, Minor stayed two nights, paying $745, for all expenses. Wayne Brown found himself at the same Sandestin hotel a couple of months later, when he spent four nights for an ACEC conference. Each night was $247, for a trip totaling $1,145.
Wayne Brown also attended an Alabama Society of Professional Land Surveyors meeting in Montgomery, Ala., in February 2009, which cost taxpayers $707.76.
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