Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, a frequent critic of government travel and similar spending, has asked HHS for an explanation of why its number of international travelers and their associated costs increased substantially in 2008.
Grassley pointed to data generated by HHS showing that compared with 2007, the number of travelers rose in 2008 to about 11,900 and the cost to $63.2 million, up about 6 and 14 percent, respectively. He also noted that employees of certain subcomponents, most notably the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control “cost much more per trip than employees at other agencies, a cost that was not attributable to distance or remoteness of destinations, but instead to business-class expenses.”
He noted that some of the cost growth may be attributable to work related to the H1N1, or swine flu, virus, but asked for a fuller accounting of HHS employee travel including similar data for 2009 and projections for 2010.
