Zien to taxpayers:
"Kiss my iron butt!"
The Journal Sentinel reports in a Sunday story that State Sen. Dave Zien, R-Eau Claire, gets paid twice as much in mileage money for driving his Harley around the state as a state employee would who doesn't happen to be elected.
For state workers who drive motorcycles, the rate is 16.2 cents a mile. Zien claims 32.5 cents -- and drives thousands and thousands of miles.
He's tone deaf about understanding why anyone would question that perk. How could anybody question somebody who's driving an American motorcycle made in Wisconsin, he asks, as if that has anything to do with the issue at hand.
Maybe a state employee, Larry Legro, could explain what's wrong with leggies treating themselves like they're special and more important than the people who actually do the work:
Larry Legro, a state X-ray inspector who frequently travels, said lawmakers "just don't get it" by not following the same standards as other employees.
"The guys who are making the rules are ignoring them themselves," he said.
Here's the story:
Zien's motorcycle riding pays off
Senator claims mileage at higher car rates
By PATRICK MARLEY
Madison - When Sen. Dave Zien (R-Eau Claire) hops on his Harley-Davidson for state business - as he routinely does - he bills taxpayers at twice the rate other state employees do.
Sen. David Zien, an Iron Butt Rally participant, was reimbursed $23,332 over a 2½-year period for mileage.
Mileage reimbursement records show that over a 2 ½ -year period, Zien was reimbursed about $7,500 more than a rank-and-file employee driving a motorcycle would have received.
Zien claimed about $15,000 in mileage reimbursement in the spring, summer and fall of 2003 and 2004 and April through June of 2005, the records show. Another state employee could claim only half that amount because the state reimburses motorcycle use at half the vehicle rate because motorcycles can get 45 miles to the gallon or more.
During that period, the rate was 32.5 cents for vehicles and 16.2 cents for motorcycles.
Zien consistently claims the higher rate, even when he drives a snowmobile on state business, he said. He said he saw nothing wrong with that practice.
"Who can be critical of someone driving an American motorcycle made in Wisconsin?" he said.
The whole story.
2 Comments:
Obviously a man who needs to ride with a helmet.
Senator Dave Zien is not a bad guy. (BUT....) I heard he he gets a military disability payment for bad wrists, from defusing landmines in VietNam (another stupid war that cost the average Amerrican lives and dollars), I think his diability pension is for about $1000/month. His two passions are riding his American Made motorcycle, and shooting handguns. He apparently sleeps in his office so he can use his $88/day tax free per diem (about $15,000 tax free dollars per year) to build his underground shooting range and then brags about it. He campaigns on his American made motorcycle throughout his large area district and then bills the taxpayers at the automobile rate, that is until me and some others wrote about this fleecing of the taxpayers. In 2000 or 2001 (I have the article from the Eau Claire Leader newspaper, he billed the taxpayers for approx 70,000 to 80,000 miles a the atuomobile rate, yielding about $21,000 in mileage. A quick calculation showed that IF a person were to drive that much, be a full time legislator in the capitol three days per week (the per diem he claims says he is there usually T, W, and Th) then that leaves him 4 days to travel. Tis means he travels about 1500 miles per week or about 400 per day. At 50 mph a generous estimate), he spends 8 hours just moving around on those four days. This is a "conservative" estimate. He flouts his American made machine having placed 800,000 plus miles on it and needing three or more engines (which by the way if you bill the state for the mileage, this supposed to take care of gas, oil AND wear and tear on your vehicle, so he has no complaint there. Right now the state employee receives .28/mile to drive their car on state business, but the legislator gets .425/mile, no questions asked. They just raised this amount from .385 to .425 around May of this year (2006) but did not recalcualte the "average cost of a DOA (state) fleet vehicle, so it stays at .28/mile. When they do recalcualte this .28/mile they use the previous yuears data, so in essence it is already outdated by one year. Gas cost 1.89/gallon a year ago, and this is the cahrge that figure uses. They will not recalculate this amount even though it is statute to do so. A boycott of the state fleet by stae employees could shut the fleet down, but so what, the Governor has already elimianted 1000 vehicles, and is keeping the ones he has (they used to send the cars to auction at or near 75,000 miles but now it is not uncommons to see fleet cars with 120,000 plus miles on them. I usually do not blog, but this one needed some more added to it. Anyone interested, just write to the Senate clerk, Mr. Marchant, or the Assembly Clerk, not sure of his name (Fieldler?) and ask them about this travesty. The clerks office is charged with processing the expense accounts of the legisaltors. Or ask you own elected leader. By the way, you want to know why a leggislator gets the standard mileage rate when they calim mileage (and they even get paid to drive to their capitol offices from their district and bac!!!)...it is because the state comptroller has determined that legislators are headquartered in their district, NOT the capitol!!! If they were headquartered at teh capitol, they'd ahve to sue state fleet cars OR claim the turndown rate...the one just about 100% of state employees get to claim, i.e. .28/mile.
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