CA Rail Paid Consultants for Travel, Perks –

Over $15 billion has been spent on the pet project of California’s impeccably coiffed Governor Gavin Newsom, the supposed high-speed rail project that has been under construction for years; it was permitted by voters in 2008, and to date, for all those billions, not one passenger has been moved one inch. It’s one of the bluntest examples of governmental incompetence and waste we have seen in years, and as you’ll be able to think about, the California rail project is up against stiff competitors.

Now we’re starting to perceive where some of that wasted money has gone, and it is not into laying any precise rail.

California’s beleaguered high-speed rail project paid more than $680,000 in doubtful journey bills to consultants linked to the project — including premium airplane tickets and rideshare journeys to gyms, nightclubs and an “escape room,” according to a damning new audit.

A report launched Tuesday by the inspector normal of the California High Speed Rail Agency discovered the division paid some $2 million in journey funds to 4 consulting companies — financial, legal and monitor design contractors — but handed out a slew of questionable reimbursements in the method.

Consultants billed the state for premium flight upgrades, prohibited worldwide journey and rideshare journeys to gyms, eating places, a cigar lounge and more, according to the report obtained by The California Post.

Maybe some of that worldwide journey was to Morocco, to see how that little Third World dictatorship is wiping California’s eye in the world of passenger rail construction?

A glance at some of the specifics sheds a lot of gentle on why this rail is still going from nowhere to nowhere.

An almost $40 Uber Black luxurious car charge for a journey of less than 1 mile in downtown Sacramento; 

Premium Uber and Lyft rides to and from a restaurant, bar and nightclub between 9:40 p.m. and 2:30 a.m. that “clearly appear to be for personal enjoyment rather than for the benefit of the state;”

Numerous meals in Folsom, where CEO Choudri has a home; 

Repeated reimbursed ride-hailing journeys to Planet Fitness gyms in and around Sacramento, even after a supervisor wrote that “the state does not cover ride share[s] to gyms”;

$118,000 in worldwide journey despite the contracts explicitly barring worldwide journey.

It’s a secure wager that this is not what California taxpayers voted for.

Now, full disclosure: When this poll initiative handed, California’s governor was Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Democrat Jerry Brown made high-speed rail a precedence in his fourth time period. Governor Newsom has also talked up this failing project, and now it is his identify that’s on the blame line. Of course, in the case of Gavin Newsom, there’s a long checklist of issues for which his identify is on that blame line.

This is a case where, in a sane world, these consultants could be dragged in entrance of the state legislature and made to reply some very pointed questions about these bills. Some are significantly egregious: an Uber Black journey of less than a mile? Sacramento’s climate is fairly gentle. They may have walked. Bars and nightclubs? Rideshare journeys to the gymnasium, which have been expressly forbidden? International journey? 

This is fraud. California’s taxpayers are getting ripped off, and that’s all there may be to it. It’s past time the high-speed rail project was deserted, and the state ought to get better what it may from this debacle and call it a lesson discovered: Never let Democrats oversee a major infrastructure project.

Editor’s Note: The Democrat Party has been contaminated by socialism, and it is spreading FAST. Democrats are claiming there’s nothing to fear about, but we all know the reality.

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