Most lawmakers drive back and forth from their home districts to their legislative office in Albany, some in New York City may take the train. Sheldon Silver, well, he flies.Yes, at a cost generally 4 times greater than the cost of taking the train. This is paid for by the taxpayer, while he racks up personal frequent flier miles. Ground alternatives are less expensive, they are also less time consuming than his flight travel route of New York to Washington DC to Albany.
The speaker has accumulated so many miles — from his public, political, and personal travels — that he is an elite-level member of an exclusive frequent flier program, which rewards him with first-class upgrades.Reform?
Hardly, if someone wants to be as wasteful as the speaker then reimbursement should be limited to the equivalent of mileage cost. If he chooses a more expensive form of travel, then he should pay anything above the normal and reasonable cost of mileage reimbursement.
The Assembly's employee information guide, a copy of which was obtained by The New York Sun, states: "Air travel should be used only when it is clearly in the Assembly's best interest to do so. When air travel is used, the most economical rate should be obtained, including super-saver fares whenever they are available."
14 comments:
IV, I just got out of work, I am in one of those aweful groups you know those unions. I was just curious, it has been a week since that Siena Poll was released and I still havent gotten your take on it. It was probably a fake poll that the evil Aubertine camp released right?
Whoa! Are you seriously gonna slam Silver for that?
What about the Republican poster girl Sarah?
"Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has charged her state a daily allowance, normally used for official travel, for more than 300 nights spent at her home, The Washington Post reported Tuesday.
An analysis of travel statements filed by the governor, now John McCain's Republican running mate, shows she claimed the per diem allowance on 312 occasions when she was home in Wasilla and that she billed taxpayers $43,490 for travel by her husband and children.
Per diem payments are meant for meals and incidental expenses while traveling on state business. State officials told The Post her claims — nearly $17,000 over 19 months — were permitted because her "duty station" is Juneau, the capital, and she was in Wasilla 600 miles away."
(http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080909/
ap_on_el_pr/palin_travel_expenses)
How do you spell hypocrite?
R-E-P-U-B-L-I-C-A-N
Republican?
How about Republican't
I do not have a problem with unions, I think they serve and have a valid function.
I do not think they should attempt to influence the political process, I favor the cleanest process of single people making their own choices and not being influenced by groups.
Nothing personal against union members.
God forbid Shelly would actually take the train from downtown Manhattan to the Rensselaer station.
Funny how Palin Derangement Syndrome shows up here in a Shelly post.
It's clear why he is doing this - the Frequent Flier Miles. Who knows what other perks he gets that FOIL requests don't reveal.
This post fits no other place, expect here is close, I guess?
Jeff Co. ready to approve JCC expansion plan ...
This $69 million dollar approach (backdoor approach, really) to expanding JCC into some sort of "higher education" thing is pretty bogus and too piecemeal ...
We need a 4-year SUNY College at Watertown - and we need it now, not this "mission creep."
A heluva lot of the money we approve here goes to schools not even located here ... that has to have some value?
To many, though, it has zero value - or so their actions say so ...
Send our money elsewhere ... just as long as our kids get educated, and then end up leaving the area.
It's the "wrong stuff," folks, really it is. And, all we do is feed the beast and creep along to what?
Shelly steals money from taxpayers. And the response is "I'm a member of a union and look at that Siena Poll"??
Look, Shelly needs to be brought under control. I appreciate the fact that in other places, be it Palen, Rangel, others, there are problems. But lets not be so stuck in our partisan ways that we cannot even recognize a problem when we see one. Shelly is a problem.
Ted, who actually pays? Last year Shelly said he did not use taxpayer funded air travel. That information was proven and verified THEN. It's NOW different?
Or, is he paying for his travel expenses out of his campaign funds...which he is totally allowed to do?
Er, I mean to address that comment to IV.
Because, I think we both know these aren't STATE funded trips...despite your careless argument pretending they are.
Smalltown...why is that anytime a non-democrat reveals something concerning about a democrat, the dems pull the "I've got a bracelet too" strategy. You slam Palin, yet ask how IV dares slam Silver. If your going to accuse anyone of being a hypocrite, at least admit that Silver's actions are at minimum questinable.
River,
Hi.
I am not in anyway endorsing Silver's actions.
My point is, if you are going to make an example of Silver, then Republican poster girl Sarah should be in the hot seat as well.
Just looking for even coverage here.
Its the double standard that bothers me, and has nothing, at least on my end, to do with who belongs to what party.
Its kind of like how soon-to-be-past St. Lawrence County Republican Chairwoman Janet Kelly was riding Addie Russell for being a new mom who doesn't have the time to be Assemblywoman, and then turns around and endorses Palin because she hunts, fishes, and her husband rides snowmobiles. Palin is a new mom as well--and her potential job would be a hell of a lot more demanding than that of Assemblywoman. Don't you think? Why the double standard?
And to further the discussion, I do not think it is right for Silver, Palin, or anyone, to travel back and forth from home to work and charge the taxpayers for it. I don't get paid time or mileage to go to work. And I'm sure not many of us reading this do either. If we are on company (or state) business, that is one thing.
There would be, however, some work to reforming that bit.
It happens right here in St. Lawrence County, as someone pointed out on my blog. And they were quite angry about it. I assume the person works or at one time worked for the County Highway Dept, because that is the beef they keep bringing up.
Certain highway dept employees drive back in forth in a county provided vehicle, free gas, etc...see here http://smalltown-america.blogspot.com/
2008/09/hook-line-sinker.html
(sorry, i haven't figured out how to insert hyperlinks yet in this thing!)
Anyway, if you are going to bring up one person to crucify, we should spread the love, regardless of which party we like or don't like.
How about Silver being from NY? If were in such a financial pickle how can we afford this type of travel?? I don't care what happens in Alaska, let's get our own house in order first.
Exactly, let's clean up our own house first. Or at least admit we've got problems right here at home. Now we've got this county gas theft that was ignored. It isn't a donkey/elephant thing, it's dishonest government.
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