Miles of Cash: The Latest from Hawaii Sunshine  

By Malia Hill  Grassroot Institute of Hawaii

In 2009, the State Department of Education classified approximately $2,220,810.42 of their expenditures as being for "Car Mileage". The expenditures were divided over several dozen different programs and departments, from the expected (athletics or bus-oriented) to the more surprising (Teleschool?).

In 2009, the state and federal mileage reimbursement rate was $0.55 per mile. This means that if every penny of those expenditures was being spent directly on car mileage reimbursement, then state employees and contractors traveled approximately 4,037,837.13 miles in 2009.

To add a little more perspective, this means that the DOE spent enough on car mileage to traverse the entire length of the H1 148,688.5 times or to drive around the equator 162 times.

No wonder rush hour traffic is so bad.

To learn more about how Hawaii's government spends taxpayer money, visit HawaiiSunshine.org. You can browse the data, submit your own Pork Alert, join the discussion in the forums, and get the "Spend of the Day" by following us on Twitter at @Sunshine4Hawaii.

Malia Hill is Project Manager for HawaiiSunshine.org and 4HawaiiansOnly.com.

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