May 17, 2011 – (RealEstateRama) — Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa has been tracking wasteful spending at public housing authorities including those in Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and Puerto Rico. He made the following comment on an audit released today, showing the Philadelphia Housing Authority wasted millions of dollars from the federal stimulus package. The audit is available here.
“This audit is the latest example of the Philadelphia Housing Authority’s, and ultimately HUD’s, failure to protect residents and taxpayers. The housing authority has been a Bermuda Triangle for tax dollars. The primary people being helped are shady developers and law firms. It’s frustrating to see such blatant abuse of tax dollars. The stimulus act $4 billion for public housing agencies nationwide. The millions of stimulus dollars wasted in Philadelphia call into question whether the rest of the $4 billion was wasted just as badly. The Philadelphia Housing Authority is the fourth-largest in the country, and it paid millions of dollars to outside law firms to obstruct inspector general audits. If other housing agencies are as troubled, and with the Obama administration’s requiring little accountability for spending, we might never know whether stimulus money for housing was spent as intended or how much went down the drain.”
