Moorlach Goes After Audit’s Findings of Caltrans “Big Lie”

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Q: What’s orange, white, black, and sleeps 6?

A:  A CalTrans work truck.

Ha-ha-ha-ha, stick around, we got a million of ‘em.  Try the meatloaf.

State Senator John Moorlach has been stirring the pot in Sacramento, as we expected he would. The Senator’s latest missive to constituents (seen below) outs CALTRANS for being the wasteful government behemoth of song and legend. You know all those Caltrans jokes about lazy, incompetent civil servants? The jokes have nothing on the real agency.

Check out the report here:

Want to ask Senator Moorlach about what he plans to DO about this now, that it is known? The Senator will be at the Anaheim Republican Assembly meeting THIS WEDNESDAY March 23rd at 7 pm.

Anaheim Republican Assembly Welcomes Senator John Moorlach

7:00 pm, American Legion Hall, 936 N. Lemon St., Anaheim

You are invited to attend the March meeting of the Anaheim Republican Assembly. Our guest speaker will be State Senator John Moorlach The meeting is FREE, and you need not be a Republican to attend. Parking is available on the street, as the AL Hall lot is very limited.  Information: Benita Gagne at benitagagne-at-gmail.com

Here’s the Moorlach’s latest press release.  [Ed. Note: Some bullet point headers have been modified for formatting reasons.]

For Immediate Release from Senator John Moorlach

Audit’s Findings of Caltrans “Big Lie” Means CA Must Reform Road Spending Before Considering Higher Taxes

“We don’t need to raise gas taxes to fix our roads. We need to stop letting Caltrans waste the money it already has and then lie about how that money is being used.” – Senator Moorlach

(Sacramento, CA) – The State Auditor’s latest report on Caltrans is the clearest signal yet that road funds are not being spent efficiently, nor in the highest-priority areas.

“This audit reinforces the fact that our bad roads are not a result of a lack of funding.  They’re a result of a lack of competence at Caltrans,” said State Senator John Moorlach (R-Costa Mesa).  “We don’t need to raise gas taxes to fix our roads.  We need to stop letting Caltrans waste the road money it already has and then lie about how that money is being used.”

The report released by the State Auditor is just the latest in a string of audits that show Caltrans is one of the worst run, and least truthful, agencies in the nation.  Here are just a few of the findings:

• Caltrans officials lied to legislators for 7 years.

Caltrans spent $250,000 on a study of how to improve field maintenance operations for greater efficiency.  Caltrans ignored the study for 7 years, but at the same time told legislators they were implementing the report’s recommendations:  “Specifically, the maintenance division never implemented a budget model (model) that it paid $250,000 to develop in 2009. Use of that model would have allowed the maintenance division to identify the resources needed to maintain highways with similar conditions at a similar level of maintenance performance (known as a service score)… although the maintenance division never implemented its model, the division has been reporting to the Legislature that it is using this sophisticated model to allocate field maintenance funding …as a result, the Legislature and other decision makers may have believed that headquarters was using a more robust approach to allocate funding to the districts than it actually was, causing those decision makers to be less likely to question the allocations.”

• Weak controls over field maintenance

“Caltrans’ weak controls over field maintenance do not adequately ensure that work order costs are reasonable and allowable and that the resources used were necessary and appropriate.”

• No supporting documentation

“No supporting documentation is maintained for work order costs, such as labor, equipment, and materials used to complete field maintenance work.”

Yesterday, Caltrans officials said they would implement this latest audit’s recommendations.  “Yeah, right,” responded Senator Moorlach.

Other key indicators that Caltrans is a broken agency:

• An audit last year by the Legislative Analysts Office found that Caltrans is overstaffed by 3,500 employees, at a cost of HALF A BILLION $$ A YEAR.
• An audit also found that one Caltrans employee had golfed for 55 days on the clock, even bragging to co-workers that he golfed as often as possible.
• An audit last year found that Caltrans has weak controls over spending, and in some cases, no controls at all.
• 62% of Caltrans projects go over budget.
• California has the nation’s highest gas taxes.
• California has the nation’s 5th highest road maintenance costs at $501,000 per mile.
• California has the nation’s 5th worst road conditions.

“The metrics tell the story.  We pay some of the nation’s highest costs for our roads, and we have some of the worst roads to show for it.  Caltrans is a broken agency,” concluded Senator Moorlach.