Travel Costs Top $1 Million In Both 2011 And 2012

Two top-ranking officials of the IRS who apparently don't care to live in Washington, D.C. are racking up millions in travel costs at taxpayer expense.

The two, Deputy Commissioner Beth Tucker, and Laural Cummings, the director of Compliance and Strategy for the Affordable Care Act, both live in Texas. An Analysis of Executive Travel Within the Internal Revenue Service released in July of this year indicates that:

"In FYs 2011 and 2012, there were 351 and 373 executives in the IRS, respectively.5 In FY 2011, the IRS spent approximately $4.8 million for executive travel. In FY 2012, spending for executive travel decreased to about $4.7 million.

"We analyzed travel information from the GovTrip and the Integrated Financial System for IRS executives to determine whether executive travel appeared to be excessive based on travel expenses claimed and the number of days traveled.

"Overall, executive travel does not appear to be excessive. However, we noted that a small number of executives had extremely high travel expenses compared to the rest of the executives and that several executives frequently travel to the Washington, D.C., area to conduct day-to-day operations. Moreover, 12 executives (seven in FY 2011 and five in FY 2012) were in travel status for over 200 days. In April 2013, the IRS instituted a new interim travel policy that generally restricts executives from being in travel status more than 75 nights in any fiscal year.

"The cost and frequency of travel for some executives indicate that they may not live in the best location to economically accomplish their roles and responsibilities. While the Federal Travel Regulation does not set any total monetary or duration limits on temporary duty travel, the IRS should consider a temporary or permanent change of station as an alternative to long-term temporary duty travel. However, the IRS does not have a policy that requires decision makers to document whether a temporary or permanent change of station was considered as an alternative to long-term temporary duty travel."

Tucker was one of the executives who was implicated in the IRS targeting of Tea Party and other conservative groups earlier this year.

The National Review reports that in some cases, the number of travel days exceeded the number of business days in on the calendar because they remained on travel status on weekends and holidays.

FMI: IRS Report