In partial response to a Freedom-of-Information-Act request by Environment Hawai`i<\/i> filed last November, the National Marine Fisheries Service Pacific Islands Regional Office in March delivered 254 pages of records relating to Western Pacific Fishery Management Council activities. This is the second bolus of documents coughed up by the council and the agency in response to the request.<\/p>\n
\tIncluded in the recent shipment were copies of the council\u2019s budgets for 2005 through 2009, which are presented to NMFS in the form of a five-year grant application. The budget was just shy of $5 million for the 2005 calendar year ($4.963 million). Increases of 5 percent were anticipated for each of the listed years, with the 2009 budget pegged at $6.159 million. The current year\u2019s budget is given as $5.848 million. Totals for the five-year period come to $27,770,862.<\/p>\n
Salaries and fringe benefits make up the largest chunk of the council budgets. For 2009, around 23 percent of the overall spending falls into this category ($1.416 million).<\/p>\n
But the budgets represent only a projection and not necessarily what the council actually has spent or will spend in future years. At a NMFS website showing all grants (including those for the regional fishery management councils), the five-year umbrella budget for the Western Pacific council shows up as $14,572,465. Scott Bloom, grant program manager for the NMFS Pacific Islands Regional Office, said he believed this amount reflected funds that NMFS has paid to the council since the inception of the award in 2005. However, details of the grant (award NA05NMF4411092 on the NOAA website, grantsonline.rdc.noaa.gov) do not support that interpretation.<\/p>\n
\tBloom also noted that the actual amounts received depend on year-to-year congressional appropriations as well as internal NMFS formulae that determine how lump-sum budget amounts are to be allocated among the regional councils.<\/p>\n
\tSo how much does the council really get and spend?<\/p>\n
\tThe question may be simple. Answering it is anything but.<\/p>\n
A Blurry Picture<\/b><\/i><\/p>\n
Money that the council receives from the federal government is awarded in the form of grants. In addition to the basic operational grants (budgets for which are included in the five-year proposal), the council also receives grants for specific projects, often the result of earmarking in the congressional budget process.<\/p>\n
\tSince the beginning of the 2006 federal fiscal year (October 1, 2005), the council has received roughly $10.8 million against its primary operational grant, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration website. An additional $2 million has been awarded to the council for assessment and management of coral reef ecosystems, adding up to some $12.865 million, or, on average, about $4.3 million a year.<\/p>\n
Documents provided to Environment Hawai`i<\/i> thus far do not show line items for the five-year umbrella grant of $14.5 million. It is thus impossible to tell from these records alone whether any given line item on the council-proposed budget has been fully funded in a given year or has been cut.<\/p>\n
\tConsider, for example, the salary of council executive director Kitty Simonds, whose 2004 base pay is stated in the budget application to have been $121,352.73. The council\u2019s proposed budget shows her base salary increasing yearly, from $126,328 in 2005 to $148,355 in 2009. To this are added annual \u201csupervisory increases\u201d (6 percent of the previous year\u2019s base pay) plus the standard 25 percent cost-of-living adjustment, making the projected annual salary range from $167,385 in 2005 to $195,571 in 2009.<\/p>\n
\tOver and above this are various fringe benefits, including contributions to retirement plans, \u201cemployer discretionary contributions\u201d of 12 percent of base pay (elsewhere in the budget documents described as \u201cprofit-sharing\u201d), and premiums for life, health, and dental insurance. (The council also pays $29,258 for \u201clong term care\u201d insurance, but this is not allocated among specific employees.)<\/p>\n
\tWhen the fringe benefits are included, Simonds\u2019 pay for 2009 rises to at least $237,995, excluding employer contributions to Social Security and Medicare.<\/p>\n
\t(A word is in order about the so-called profit sharing: along with Simonds, all other full-time regular employees of the council receive this benefit. As one internet site explains, \u201cdiscretionary contributions are employer contributions that are unrelated to employee contributions. They are analogous to contributions made by an employer to a qualified profit sharing plan, where the employer may or may not make a contribution each year.\u201d The contribution goes into a fund, much like an IRA or 401(k) plan, that can only be drawn against when a worker retires or under other restricted conditions. This is over and above the \u201cretirement contribution\u201d of 3 percent that council workers receive and the standard Social Security and Medicare contributions.)<\/p>\n
\tBut without more information, it is impossible to know exactly what Simonds has been paid since 2004.<\/p>\n
\tAnd under the terms and conditions of the council\u2019s grant award, it would seem as though even NMFS itself does not know Simonds\u2019 salary. Bloom of the PIRO grant program office says that the council is obligated to provide periodic reports on its expenditures, but that these reports include only lump-sum amounts of what was spent. No breakdown of expenditures is required, he told Environment Hawai`i<\/i>.<\/p>\n
No Volunteers Here<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
Contrary to what members of the public may think, members of the council do not serve as volunteers, but instead receive pay of $623 each day that they attend to council business or travel to or from council meetings. (Base pay is set for 2008 at $498 a day, plus a cost-of-living adjustment of $125 a day, which council members receive since they are regarded as federal employees for the days they \u201cwork\u201d for the council.)<\/p>\n
\tIn addition to the pay they receive for council meetings, members also are paid for days they are on official council business. For example, in 2008, council chair Sean Martin is anticipated to have 12 meetings with Executive Director Simonds, and for each meeting, he will receive $623 \u2013 even if the meeting lasts only an hour. That comes to $7,470, over and above the $9,345 that he receives for attending three council meetings. Whenever the council meets in a location other than Honolulu, as it did earlier this year, Martin would receive daily pay for his travel time, and, if the council meets unexpectedly \u2013 as it did in April, when it had to re-do the votes taken at the (improperly noticed) Guam meeting, Martin gets paid again. When Martin goes to Washington to discuss NMFS\u2019 budget, that, too, qualifies for five days\u2019 pay, or $3,115 (plus the daily allowance for lodging, meals, and incidentals). When he attends the meeting of regional fishery council chairs, he racks up another $3,115 in pay. There may be additional meetings he attends; the budget documents are not clear in identifying which council members are expected to attend the various tuna conferences and other meetings that are listed in the \u201ccouncil compensation\u201d spreadsheet. It\u2019s probably safe to say, though, that pay for Martin alone comes to between $25,000 and $30,000 for the current year.<\/p>\n
\tAltogether, the 2008 budget anticipates council compensation to the tune of $152,951. This does not include travel or per-diem costs, which, as of May 1, rose to $283 a day for Honolulu. (Per-diem rates are supposed to cover members\u2019 costs of lodging, meals, and incidentals.) Total travel costs for the council members are estimated at $83,195 for 2008.<\/p>\n
Ghost Employees?<\/b><\/i><\/p>\n
For the entire five-year period of the budget, the council staff roster includes a deputy director. For 2005, the position is shown as vacant, but for 2006 and beyond, the deputy director\u2019s position is indicated to be filled at a salary of $105,470 in 2006, increasing to $119,000 in 2009. At no time has the position been filled. For the four-year period from 2006 through 2009, the total amount budgeted for this position comes to roughly half a million dollars. Other positions for which funds are requested remain unfilled as well, to judge from a comparison of the staff listed on the council\u2019s website (www.wpcouncil.org) against the budget.<\/p>\n
\tDo the unfilled positions mean that the council has unspent funds that accumulate? If so, what approvals, if any, are needed for the funds to be redirected to other programs?
\n\tUnder standard terms and conditions of awards made by the Department of Commerce, NOAA\u2019s parent agency, recipients have to spend the money in accord with the budgets approved in the grant award process. According to Bloom, any redirection of funds has to be approved by him (as grant program officer) or, should the amount exceed 10 percent of the total grant award.<\/p>\n
\tBut beyond that, there seems to be little control over how the council spends its money. \u201cWe\u2019re limited by public law 106-107,\u201d Bloom said. \u201cThe only thing the grantee is required to do with financial reporting is to submit form SF272, for cash transactions. This gives us a snapshot, it tells us how much you spent. But it\u2019s a lump sum. They also submit an activities report, but they don\u2019t have to report what any given activity cost. We can\u2019t change that.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tAbsent evidence to the contrary, he said, NMFS has to assume its grantees exercise proper stewardship of federal funds and maintain books accurately reflecting expenditures and income. \u201cA grantee recipient of federal funds should be honest,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\tStill and all, he added, the loose reporting requirements \u201care a huge consternation, agency-wide.\u201d Efforts to obtain comment from the council\u2019s financial officer time were unsuccessful by press time.<\/p>\n
— Patricia Tummons<\/p>\n
Volume 18, Number 12 June 2008<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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