Billions Wasted, Zero Consequences: No One Fired, Demoted, or Punished

Major stories about government fraud and waste make headlines for only a day or two before vanishing. Because the media quickly drops these stories, the people responsible avoid accountability and keep profiting from the wasteful and fraudulent system. Politicians make promises to fix the problem, but rarely is anything meaningful done as the waste and fraud continue.

Here are three recent examples:

1. On August 22^nd WATech (Washington State government’s technology oversight office) announced it was scrapping a $292M IT upgrade for the Department of Labor and Industries (L&I) that has been in the works for a decade. Worse, 37% of the state’s 56 IT projects (costing taxpayers $2.3 billion) were facing similar issues and were at “significant risk.” This means that the state could soon be scrapping approximately a billion dollars in wasted IT efforts.Poor morale, indecisive L&I leadership, and high turnover were blamed, but yet, no one has been fired, demoted, or punished for this massive waste of taxpayer dollars. Washington Governor Bob Ferguson stated that those responsible continue to have his “full support,” despite 10 years of miscues.
2. A new audit found that the King County Department of Community and Human Services (DCHS) sent numerous faulty payments to vendors and had such lax financial oversight that investigators warned of massive fraud taking place. DCHS only reviewed 1% of its disbursements (law requires a minimum of reviewing 33% of its expenditures). This occurred as DCHS’s grant program significantly increased from $922 million in 2019 to more than $1.8 billion in 2024. Two years ago, the Discovery Institute warned that lax oversight was causing the county to pay millions for ineffective housing services and created an environment for fraud.The progressive members of the King County Council all expressed outrage that this occurred, yet it is precisely their fault DCHS was allowed to spend billions without tracking payments or results for two years.Again, no one has been fired, demoted, or punished for this massive waste of taxpayer dollars. Councilmember  Dunn has put forth measures to stop this wasteful spending from occurring in the future.  We should note these poor management practices occurred at DCHS and within other county programs (such as youth diversion) when Dow Constantine was County Executive. Constantine recently resigned from that position to accept a $6 million pay package to lead Sound Transit.
3. Sound Transit revealed a $35 billion “construction shortfall” to build the light rail lines promised to the voters. This will force the Sound Transit board to cancel building future lines, alter the construction schedule, or go back to voters to ask for more money. The primary reason for the massive cost-overruns is poor management causing delays (as inflation drives higher costs) and non-revenue riders making up 44% of the ridership. It is estimated that households within the agency’s taxing district (urban areas in King, Pierce, and Snohomish counties) pay an average of $1,700 annually for the light-rail system, whether they ride the trains or not. The current $185,000,000,000 price tag is rapidly approaching three times the original budget. On the individual level, this means each of the 3.4 million people who live in the district is responsible for $55,000 in taxes that people outside the district are not.This shortfall has been years in the making. Washington Policy Center’s Charles Prestrud stated the problem is due to how the board was purposefully isolated from public oversight. “The public really has no way of holding the board accountable. They (board members) can’t be booted off by the public, and you can’t run against them.” Similarly, no one has been fired, demoted, or punished for this massive waste of taxpayer dollars. Sound Transit said it will reveal its “recovery” plan sometime in 2026.

Why is massive wasteful spending occurring now at all levels of government?  It is likely because reckless progressives control all levels of local government, and the extremist politicians and the powerful special interest groups who benefit from a larger government and more government spending, do not want to correct the problem.

These politicians almost never conduct a meaningful investigation into serious financial malfeasance. For example, it has been five years, and there has never been a legitimate legislative investigation into how the Washington State Department of Employment Security allowed one of the largest thefts in America’s history to take place when more than $700 million was fraudulently stolen at the start of the COVID shutdown.

What are the answers to these problems?  Here are some suggestions.

• Numerous groups and transportation analysts have been calling for direct election of the Sound Transit Board of Directors who are currently appointed by one of the three county executives. This will make board members more beholden to the taxpayers instead of the special interest groups, contractors, and other politicians. If the public is paying for it, shouldn’t we have a say in how the money is spent?
• Respected transportation policy expert Bob Pishue argues it is time for the Washington State Auditor to “conduct a comprehensive performance audit (on Sound Transit) to examine the causes of the overruns and delays.”
• Senator John Braun (R – Centralia) suggests the state needs to hire “qualified project managers, not political appointees” to oversee technical programs and Representative Travis Couture (R – Shelton) called for more transparency in the legislative budget process.
• Councilmember Reagan Dunn’s proposal includes requiring the King County Department of Community and Human Services to adopt “best practices” for contract management and compliance monitoring and to report back to the council by March 31, 2026.
• Finally, government officials should be fired, demoted, or punished if they are responsible for massive waste of taxpayers’ money.

Simply put, the majority party’s fear of public accountability must end, and more public transparency is needed.  Wasting money intended for those in need is NOT compassionate; in fact, it’s cruel.