The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "travel expenses" ...
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Trouble in Jayhawk Nation
A look into the University of Kansas' athletic program reveals a corrupt system. The Star reveals that the university's athletic director was paid an exorbitant salary and also uncovers connections between university officials and the felon who illegally resold hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of basketball tickets.
Tags: University of Kansas; athletic department; ticket resale; basketball; travel expenses; salary
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Treasury Luxury Travel
The Oregonian's investigation spotlighted an obscure corner of state government where Wall Street practices became business as usual, where a set of high-paid employees were granted special exemptions to operate outside the scope of state gift and ethics laws, and functioned with little internal or public oversight. The newspaper revealed that state investment officers charged with monitoring more than $50 billion in state pension investments routinely travel in luxury, paid for by taxpayers and the Wall Street investment managers they are supposed to be overseeing. They stay at high-end resorts and five-star hotels, eat at celebrated restaurants and fly first class. The tab is often picked up by investment firms managing Oregon's investments, who are competing for hundreds of millions of dollars in fees that the pension fund pays annually. The state treasury didn't monitor that travel. It kept no record of the expenses or gratuities provided its employees. And it ignored the potential conflicts of interest.
Tags: State Government; Corruption; Finance; Wall Street; Exemption; Business; Gift and Ethics Law; Travel; State Treasury; State Employees
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Pentagon Travel
"Pentagon Travel" details special interest involvement in Pentagon travel expenses. A year-long analysis revealed that between 1998 and 2007 22,000 Pentagon trips worth at least $26 million were funded by business and foreign interests. The Center for Public Integrity in conjunction with Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism uncover the specific Pentagon relationships with outside interests sponsoring military trips.
Tags: Pentagon; travel; expenses; outside interests; military; kickbacks
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DFW Travel Spending
CBS News 11 reviewed thousands of pages of documents pertaining to travel expenses by executives and board members who oversee DFW International Airport. They discovered dozens of trips around the country and around the world where executives enjoyed first-class travel, accommodations and meals at the expense of airport users and taxpayers, at a time when the airport faced a multi-million dollar budget shortfall and had publicly announced plans to control expenses. They also found that the airport CEO was the highest paid airport executive in the United states and that he and dozens of other employees had car allowances for travel to and from work. They also reviewed executive compensation packages and discovered 100 airport employees who made at least $100,000 more than any other airport in the country.
Tags: Dallas; Dallas-Fort Worth; airport; corporate spending; executive pay; perks; Texas
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Congressional Travel
The three-month investigation scrutinized trips known as CODELs, or Congressional Delegations, and uncovered millions of tax dollars being spent each year to send members of Congress to exotic locations around the world under the premise of "fact-finding trips."
Tags: travel; federal spending; trip; Galapagos Islands; House of Representatives; junket; expense report; CODEL
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City councilman forced to resign over double billing
Acting on a tip from an anonymous source, the newspaper began an investigation of travel and meal expenses by members of the Roanoke City Council. The focus quickly shifted to councilman Alfred Dowe. Travel expense forms, receipts, credit card statements and other documents showed Dowe spent nearly $15,000 on city-related meals, lodging and travel in 2007 - almost as much as the other six council members.
Tags: city council; city government; travel expenses; Virginia; reimbursement; expenditure
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Dart Travel Spending
CBS 11 News reviewed thousands of pages of documents pertaining to travel expenses and credit card purchases by executives and staff members who manage Dallas Area Rapid Transit, AKA DART. We discovered dozens trips around the country and around the world for seminars. While traveling, executives enjoyed expensive accommodations. The station also found questionable expenditures on expensive catering, gift cards and purchases from Victoria's Secret. The expenses came at a time when the agency faced a $1,000,000,000 budget shortfall that jeopardized key transportation projects. CBS 11 producers followed a group of executives and board members to a transit junket in California where we watched as many skipped key meetings, attended steak dinners and parties thrown by companies who bid on transit projects. The station also watched as DART executives and staff members violated internal policies by using taxis and shuttles instead of local mass transit, a pattern found while reviewing dozens of other out-of-town junkets.
Tags: mass transit; Dallas; fraud; transit authority; travel expenses; questionable spending
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Investigating Five Rivers
An investigation into Five Rivers, a nonprofit meant to help find jobs and buy homes for those with low to moderate incomes, found that there was mismanagement of money. The majority of the revenues during the past 10 years "went towards the salary, health and life insurance, travel, meals and other expenses that benefited Five Rivers' executive director and her children."
Tags: nonprofit; mismanagement; lobbyist; Five Rivers; federal money
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Mesa Community College
Community College administrators have been travelling to expensive international destinations, at the expense of taxpayers. The Republic investigatesd, finding "while the trips were billed as intense working sessions, financial records revealed that 87 college officials were spending more time sightseeing than working." Maricopa Community Colleges had presented the trips as part of a push to create an online learning program in China, "and to create partnerships with colleges in the Netherlands and England." That system includes 10 county colleges with an operating budget on $900 million. The investigation found that the director of the China Project "was hiding expenses from the college, writing herself contracts for work she didn't perform and paying employees overtime they didn't work as a form of reward." As a result of the stories, Mesa Community College suspended international travel.
Tags: Maricopa Community Colleges; Mesa Community College; College officials; travel; tax dollars
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Lawyers' bills to state don't add up
"The stories revealed that North Carolina's system for paying appointed lawyers is vulnerable to financial errors and abuse. One lawyer had repeatedly double-billed. On more than 50 occasions, he submitted multiple bills for expenses such as travel time, mileage and parking for what records indicated were single jail visits. Other lawyers had charged for visits that don't appear in jail records."
Tags: False report; Indigent Defense Services; Mecklenburg Country Sheriff; fraud; state appointed lawyers