Extra! Extra!

FEMA payouts questioned in several states

Sally Kestin and Megan O'Matz of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel continue their investigation into the Federal Emergency Management Agency with a story showing that reports of possible fraud are coming from several states. Officials from Mobile, Ala., to Detroit say the federal government has pumped millions of dollars into their communities, even after officials told FEMA their communities had no significant damage from storms. Members of Congress have called for a Government Accountability Office investigation into FEMA spending as a result of the series of stories, which began in October with an examination of what is now $29.2 million in aid sent to Miami-Dade County following Hurricane Frances, which hit 100 miles to the north of the county.

Donors find loophole in N.J. rules

Shannon Harrington of The Record in Bergen County, N.J., finds that "political fund-raisers are already bypassing New Jersey's much-touted campaign finance reform" that went into effect Oct. 15. According to the new rules, "any engineer, accountant or other government vendor who contributes to the governor's campaign account — or to the political party committees at both the state and county levels — is banned from receiving state contracts in excess of $17,500. The loophole is that municipal committees are not covered by the order." Harrington reports that in Bergen County, the Democrats are "funneling hundreds of thousands of dollars through the towns."

Legislators' families benefit from ties

Chuck Neubauer and Ted Rohrlich of the Los Angeles Times report that in the past year and a half, "the Times has identified five House members and seven senators whose family members have worked for clients that benefited from the lawmakers' official actions." Among those to have capitalized on a family member's position: "U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters' family members have made more than $1 million in the last eight years by doing business with companies, candidates and causes that the influential congresswoman has helped." Researcher Mark Madden contributed to the story.

Polluters get lenient treatment in Colo.

Miles Moffeit and Theo Stein of The Denver Post reveal that "the London Mine, one of the richest gold-ore strikes in Colorado history, has hemorrhaged toxic metals into South Mosquito Creek for decades, killing fish habitat over a mile-long stretch," yet the state's Department of Public Health and Environment has never levied a fine. "This year, the mine owner and a developer persuaded the state to relax the pollution limits. Now the mine won't violate them so often." Researcher Monnie Nilsson and CAR Editor Jeff Roberts contributed to the story. (Editor's note: For useful tips on reporting similar stories, see the latest IRE Beat Book, "Covering Pollution: An Investigative Reporter's Guide.")

Cleveland students advance despite test scores

Ebony Reed and Thomas Gaumer of The (Cleveland, Ohio) Plain Dealer analyzed state education data to find that "more than 95 percent of Cleveland fourth- and sixth-graders were promoted at the end of last school year, even though better than half the students in those grades failed state reading or math exams." Promotion rates varied among schools and grades, but "the gap between promotion rates and test scores is even more pronounced for black and Hispanic students, who fail the tests more often than their white classmates."

Pregnant women more likely to be killed

A year-long examination by Donna St. George of The Washington Post, using death-record data, documents the killings of 1,367 pregnant women and new mothers since 1990. This is only part of the national toll, because no reliable system is in place to track such cases." Several statewide studies have shown that pregnant women and new mothers are more likely to be victims of homicide than to die of any single natural cause. "The Post's analysis shows that the killings span racial and ethnic groups. In cases whose details were known, 67 percent of women were killed with firearms." Many women were slain at home, usually by men they knew. Writer David S. Fallis and researcher Bobbye Pratt contributed to the report.

Conflict of interest on regulatory board

Brent Schrotenboer of the San Diego Union-Tribune reports that "because California puts few restrictions on who can serve on the California Horse Racing Board that oversees the state's $3 billion horse-racing industry, the panel is principally composed of people who have a significant economic stake in the sport." At least six of the seven board members acknowledge that they gamble at tracks and five of them actively own or breed racehorses in the state.

Taser used against juveniles, pregnant women

Phuong Cat Le and Hector Castro of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer find that Tasers have been used "to end violent standoffs and subdue suicidal people, but a P-I review found they're also being used routinely in far less threatening situations — including against juveniles, pregnant women and people who have already been handcuffed." The P-I reports "69 deaths nationwide have been reported after tasings, including three in the Puget Sound area." The report includes a story about Taser International, "a multimillion-dollar company providing Tasers to thousands of law enforcement agencies across the country and military units around the world."

Gymnasts' risk of injury rivals that of NFL players

Scott M. Reid of The Orange County Register interviewed 122 elite women gymnasts and found "a culture in which pain and suffering are acceptable risks in the quest for success." Reid's reporting "found that the obsession with Olympic gold has created a system in which injuries are so prevalent that athletes are as likely to require surgery during their careers as National Football League players." Other findings: the rate of injuries has almost doubled in the past eight years, 90 percent of gymnasts continued training while they were injured, and the sport's obsession with weight and diet has led to eating disorders.

Data shows suspicious gains in test scores

Holly Hacker and Joshua Benton of The Dallas Morning News turned a story about one school's alleged cheating on standardized tests into a piece about cheating across the state. She used regression analysis to show some suspicious improvements among historically low-performing schools, including a "desperately impoverished school where the fourth-graders have trouble adding and subtracting - but nearly all the fifth-graders got perfect scores on the math portion of the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills." The Morning News also reports that the Texas Education Agency doesn't use their own data to perform a similar analysis.

College apparel still made in sweatshops

Matthew Kauffman and Lisa Chedekel of The Hartford Courant find that college-licensed apparel is produced in sweatshop conditions, despite pledges made by academic leaders five years ago. "But today, the $20 T-shirts and $40 sweat shirts that bear the logos of UConn and other major universities are sewn under conditions that are as dismal as those that prompted the pledges — and rapidly getting worse."

Pension loopholes affect local taxpayers

Chris Christoff and Kathleen Gray of the Detroit Free Press studied area public employee pensions, finding some "have paid off big to those helped by generous retirement rules or, in some cases, political connections... In other cases, the cost of public pensions has resulted in local tax increases or potential burdens for future taxpayers." While most government workers' pensions are steady if unspectacular, some used loopholes or connections to boost their payouts. A sheriff too young to retire with a full pension "got himself demoted for one day - with no pay cut - to lieutenant in the Sheriff's Department, where he had worked for 25 years. It allowed him to retire immediately with a $72,800-a-year pension. He continues to collect the pension on top of his $128,000 salary as sheriff."

Best tests not available to U.S. veterans

Bob Evans of The Daily Press in Newport News, Va., has a series about the use of depleted uranium in weapons and the science that shows links between the element and illness. "In the past few years, while the media and public have been paying attention to another war in the region, doctors and researchers have been finding out more about depleted uranium and how it might be responsible for some of the problems suffered by veterans of the Gulf War." Evans also looks at a new testing program that's available to British veterans. The British tests are more rigorous and accurate than those used by the U.S. military. "The Pentagon says U.S. vets don't need it."

Chronic polluter escapes fines

Chris Bowman of The Sacramento Bee used state records to show that a Merced County cheese maker avoided spending millions on waste treatment equipment by dumping polluted materials onto land leased by the company. "The water board has recorded at least 4,000 violations against Hilmar Cheese in the past four years alone, making it one of California's most chronic offenders of clean-water laws. Yet, for years not a single fine or injunction was issued. Instead of cracking down, the Valley water board kept raising the limit on wastewater volume at the cheese maker's request, as production kept growing." (Editor's note: For those interested in doing similar stories, be sure to see IRE's latest beat book: "Covering Pollution: An Investigative Reporter's Guide.")

Iowa employee travel costs on increase

Jonathan Roos of the Des Moines Register analyzed spending on travel by Iowa government employees, finding that "spending on state employee travel, after dropping during a round of belt-tightening, is again on the rise despite continued tight budgets." The state spent $41 million on travel during fiscal 2004, and more than 500 employees racked up at least $10,000 in travel costs. Athletic recruiting by state university coaches was a significant factor: "Sixteen of the 20 state employees with the biggest travel tabs came from the university ranks. Seven were coaches. Four were professors. Three were administrators."

Poor schools get teachers who failed

Chris Davis and Matthew Doig of the Sarasota Herald-Tribune find that a third of Florida teachers failed the teaching certification test at least once; that schools in poor neighborhoods and those with a high number of minority students get teachers who failed the test more often, and those teachers scored lower on every section of the test. The series includes a sidebar detailing what data the paper used and its methodology. There is also a story about the state's reluctance to release public information.

D.C. donors trade easements for tax breaks

Joe Stephens of The Washington Post, with contributions from Sarah Cohen and Alice Crites, has a two-part series on the practice of donating historic facade easements to nonprofits in turn for a tax break for the homeowner. "Such tax deductions are increasingly common although the District already bars unapproved and historically inaccurate changes in the facades of homes in the city's many historic districts. As a result, easement donors largely are agreeing not to change something that they cannot change anyway." The paper identified about 900 residences with such easements in Washington, with the average assessed value of the property at more than $1 million. The Web presentation includes an interactive map.

Illegal gambling prevalent in Ky.

In a two-part series, Grace Schneider and Lesley Stedman Weidenbener of The (Louisville, Ky.) Courier-Journal found that illegal video poker and slot-like machines are widespread in Kentucky. "Over two days, a reporter found 137 machines at 19 truck stops, convenience stores and fast-food restaurants located at 15 exits." Among the problems with illegal machines: the operators can make their own rules — with lower payout rates than the state would require; experts say video gambling is highly addictive; and state and local governments can't tax the profits generated by illegal machines. "The Courier-Journal spent nine months examining illegal video gambling in Kentucky and Indiana. It reviewed hundreds of records in the two states and interviewed dozens of government and industry officials."

Oil refineries missing deadlines

Scott Streater of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram finds the Environmental Protection Agency has "quietly allowed oil refineries nationwide to miss court-mandated deadlines to reduce air emissions, prolonging the exposure of hundreds of thousands of people to dangerous pollutants." The article is based on an analysis of progress reports submitted by refineries that have settled, released by the EPA through the federal Freedom of Information Act, and interviews with more than 50 environmental regulators, legal experts and oil company officials. A second story looks at a deal the EPA has struck a deal to clean up five refineries owned by ChevronTexaco.

Calif. Indians on brink of casino riches

Thomas Peele and John Simerman of the Contra Costa Times examined the Indian tribe and political players behind the controversial Casino San Pablo project that will house 2,500 slot machines. One story traces the history of the tribe that will operate the casino, the 277-member Lytton Band of Pomo Indians. Peele's story shows how a homeless Indian family settled unused government land in 1937 and 67 years parlayed their tenuous claim of tribal status to stand on the verge of unimaginable casino riches. Simerman's story shows how an act of Congress and a governor eager to share in casino profits created a situation in which the tribe will soon operate far more slot machines than it first proposed.

Tax abatements have pitfalls

L.A. Lorek of the San Antonio Express-News found that 42 percent of San Antonio companies that have been granted tax abatements since 1989 have either failed, transferred their abatement or didn't do the approved project. Also, the number of created (and the type of jobs) fell short of the number of jobs promised. A sidebar on school tax abatements also details how a Texas law now permits school districts to grant abatements once again. And a searchable database lets the public examine all 57 tax abatements.

Limited improvement made in nursing homes

Alice Dembner and Bill Dedman, in The Boston Globe, find that in the past two years nursing homes have made "progress in some areas of patient care, but no gains in others." The analysis looked at changes made after the Bush administration's move to publicly grade nursing homes and post the quality scores on the Internet for the nation's 16,500 nursing facilities, designed to marshal public pressure to spur change."Fewer residents are suffering from untreated pain and fewer are being placed in physical restraints, according to the analysis." However, the Globe found no "significant impact on the portion of residents with pressure sores. Nor did it increase the share of residents who were able to walk, or feed themselves, or use the bathroom on their own."

Tampa Bay has most mobile homes

Baird Helgeson and Doug Stanley of The Tampa Tribune used state data to show that "the Tampa Bay area, where many of more than 3 million people are jammed along bays and beaches, has the heaviest concentration of mobile homes in the state." Most of the region's mobile homes were built before tougher standards were put in place in the wake of Hurricane Andrew in 1992, and one-third were manufactured before any federal safety requirements were enacted. In addition, "thousands of owners have not registered their mobile homes with the state as required by law. Though state records show about 400,000 mobile homes in Florida, more than in any other state, the U.S. Census pegs the number at more than double that, at 850,000."

Calif. fertility industry poorly regulated

Mary Anne Ostrom of the San Jose Mercury News reports that "state oversight of a California fertility industry that performs more than 11,000 embryo implants a year is lax. The quality-control system now in place favors doctors over patients. The California Department of Health Services has only two inspectors to monitor the state's 300 tissue labs, a figure that includes 50 fertility labs. And RESOLVE, the nation's largest fertility-patient network, refers patients to fertility doctors but does not adequately monitor their performance."

N.C. car owners miss out on tax break

Pat Stith and David Raynor of The (Raleigh, N.C.) News & Observer analyzed state records to find that a North Carolina tax break for high-mileage vehicles often goes unclaimed. "You're entitled to a break if your car or truck has high mileage, but you have to ask. Tax officials have some mileage information — and could get the rest — but they don't adjust the bills before sending them out. About 290,000 vehicles in the Triangle qualify for a tax cut." Local tax collectors say that while one-third of the cars in the area qualify for the tax break, less than one percent of owners appeal their tax bills.

Reservists frustrated by medical holds

Marsha Austin and Eileen Kelly of The Denver Post examined the "medical hold" system used by the National Guard and the Army Reserve. More than 13,000 mentally and physically ill soldiers have spent time in a "medical holdover" unit, a system that some say denies them access to quality care. "Beyond the frustration of being cooped up in a barracks, with untreated mental and physical ailments, reservists and guardsmen say the system frustrates their efforts to be medically retired, a discharge that requires an Army judgment of 30 percent disability and comes with a lifetime monthly pension and access to military perks such as commissary stores."

Businesses use farming to avoid taxes

Paula Lavigne, Kevin Krause and Ed Housewright of The Dallas Morning News used property tax data to show that "on thousands of acres of North Texas land, big business and other private interests have found a way to save millions of dollars with agricultural side operations. For these savvy corporations and land speculators, every munching cow and hay bale spells annual savings, thanks to property tax breaks originally intended to help farmers." Dallas, Denton, Tarrant and Collin counties lose millions in annual tax revenue, particularly taxes for public schools. A map shows the proliferation of these land parcels.

Police use stun guns for compliance

Robert Anglen of The Arizona Republic analyzed police reports of Taser-related incidents in 2003 and "found that Phoenix police were far more likely to use the stun guns to make someone obey orders at a traffic stop than to bring down an armed robber." More than 5,000 police agencies, including 108 in Arizona, have armed their officers with Tasers. "The Republic's analysis of use-of-force records shows that in nearly nine out of 10 cases, individuals did not threaten police with weapons."

NYC uses HIV kids as guinea pigs

In a nine-month investigation, BBC reporter Jamie Doran discovered that HIV-positive children in New York City are being given experimental and highly toxic drugs, without the consent of guardians or relatives. One doctor who has studied the effects of such drugs says they are "lethal." If parents or caretakers refuse to give children the medication, the city's Administration of Children's Services can remove the children and place them "with foster parents or in children's homes, where they can continue to give them experimental drugs."

Charity has links to global terror group

Mark Morris of The Kansas City Star, working with Jaimi Dowdell and Aaron Kessler, used documents from the Treasury Department and other agencies to compile a list of organizations and individuals connected to a Columbia, Mo., charity that federal officials allege is "part of the Islamic African Relief Agency, a global charity whose officers had raised at least $5 million for terrorists." The reporters used social network analysis software to produce a visual representation of the network. "The analysis showed that IARA officials allegedly performed services or favors for bin Laden and his organizations. Other times, IARA was alleged to have teamed with bin Laden to support other terrorists." The story includes a graphic representation of the IARA connections around the world. (Warning: Large PDF)

Questionable expenses uncovered in N.Y. school district

Karla Schuster, Eden Laikin and Theresa Vargas of Newsday, with assistance from Stacey Altherr and Richard Dalton, obtained computerized spending records for Long Island's 125 school districts, finding that spending in Hempstead often exceeded similarly-sized districts: "While Hempstead students were served spoiled food and attended class in crumbling buildings, the school district was spending millions of dollars on expenses that had little direct benefit for children, such as professional travel, temp agencies, catering, cell phones and consultants." Since July 1, 1999, the Hempstead district has spent hundreds of thousands on travel, catering and temporary labor, among other items. "The district's expenses for bottled water totaled about $315,000 between July 1999 and June 2004, an average of about $63,000-a-year -- more than 22 times the combined annual average of all the other districts analyzed."

Revolving door for Florida's juvenile justice employees

Kathleen Chapman and William M. Hartnett of the Palm Beach Post used state data to find "at least 200 employees hired at juvenile justice centers in recent years after they were fired from similar jobs for violence, misconduct or incompetence. The taxpayer-funded privately operated companies that run the bulk of Florida's juvenile justice system hired workers who had sexual relationships with teenagers they were supposed to protect. They hired workers who kicked, punched, choked, tackled and head-butted teens in their care. Supervisors across the state repeatedly checked 'do not rehire' and 'not eligible for rehire' in the files of employees fired for such offenses. But managers at other centers never knew of those histories."

Emergency shelter not built to refuge standards

Melanie Payne, Jeff Cull and Steve McQuilkin of the (Fort Myers,Fla.) News-Press used public records to investigate the construction of a 2-year-old civic center that collapsed during Hurricane Charley, endangering the lives of nearly 1,400 people who sought refuge there. Although DeSoto County invested $8 million in the project, "when it came to spending money on things that might have made the building safer and disaster-resistant the county opted not to spend the extra funds." The reporters also found that although the Turner Agri-Civic Center was built to be used as an emergency evacuation shelter, the county "now can't locate weekly engineering reports or key engineering documents to prove that the building's design and materials should have held up under hurricane-force winds."

Top-notch employees cost city top dollars

Joseph Gerth of The (Louisville) Courier-Journal reports that the $700,000 savings in salary created by the merger of Louisville and Jefferson County governments "is now gone, and for the right reason, according to Mayor Jerry Abramson: to pay top-dollar salaries to attract qualified administrators." The paper compared salary data for managers at the "assistant director" level and above, finding that "total pay for those jobs rose by about 10 percent since February 2003."

Iowa schools face heat on standards

Madelaine Jerousek of The Des Moines Register compiled records on the academic performance of Iowa high school graduates, finding that " one in 10 college freshmen who graduated from Iowa's high schools failed to muster at least a D average at the state's three public universities last school year." About 5 percent of the nearly 7,000 students who graduated from Iowa public high schools in 2003 and enrolled at a state university took remedial math courses covering material they should have learned in high school.

Reviewing first month of Taser use

Ian Demsky of The (Nashville) Tennessean analyzed the local police department's first month of using Tasers. The review shows that of the first seven people shocked five were unarmed, all were young black men, and one was already in handcuffs.

Deadly errors and politics betray a hospital's promise

Tracy Weber, Charles Ornstein and Mitchell Landsberg of the Los Angeles Times, with assistance from Steve Hymon, Scott Wilson and Sandra Poindexter, spent months investigating the state of Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center, a public hospital in L.A.'s Willowbrook neighborhood. "The investigation reveals that King/Drew is much more dangerous than the public has been told."

Construction workers falling to deaths

Barbara Clements and David Wickert of The (Tacoma) News Tribune investigate deaths of construction workers and find that three workers die every day in the United States, with about a third of those from falls. A review of Washington state data shows that such workers are more likely to fall to his death than any other cause. Clements and Wickert review the reasons.

U.S. 50 deadly in Kansas

Hurst Laviana of The Wichita Eagle used a state database of highway deaths to show that the Kansas portion of U.S. 50 is "arguably the state's deadliest highway. Ninety-seven people died on the highway from 1999 through the end of 2003, more than any other two-lane road in the state." Interstate 70, which has many times the traffic of U.S. 50, also had 97 deaths during the same period. Each county that U.S. 50 passes through in Kansas had at least one fatality. The paper also described its methodology. (Editor's note: The November/December issues of The IRE Journal and Uplink feature investigations of transportation issues, including drunken drivers, speeders and trucks violating safety rules.)

County records missing, incomplete

Steve Patterson of the Chicago Sun-Times examined records from the Cook County Forest Preserve District, which provides low-cost housing to employees who perform a series of monthly tasks: "Check for fires, trespassers, illegal dumping and hunters, then fill out a checklist every month of what was found. But records provided to the Chicago Sun-Times show 93 percent of those employees aren't doing the bare minimum. And, officials admit, they can't provide housing report records from 1999 through 2002 because they can't find them. The records they did find show six employees have virtually ignored the basic requirement of turning in a monthly report, filing fewer than three reports each since 2003."

Fla. county's 911 calls delayed, unanswered

In a four-month investigation, Scott Zamost and Patricia Andreu of WTVJ-Miami tracked how long it takes operators to answer 911 calls in Broward County. The station obtained computer records of emergency call times to Broward's main 911 center, and found case after case of delays in answering emergency lines. WTVJ examined nearly 29,000 emergency calls made to the Broward Sheriff's Office and found that an average of only 65 percent of calls were picked up within 10 seconds, with more than 350 ringing more than a minute in the two-week period examined.

Parks bond issue used for unrelated buildings

Ben Smith of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reviewed DeKalb County purchases of park land, finding that a $125 million bond program approved in 2001 helped create a regional park, but "the DeKalb County Commission and CEO Vernon Jones used the same bond program to buy dozens of buildings of no use to parks." The buildings purchased include an abandoned church and an office complex. "DeKalb's 2001 bond issue is running short of money for park acquisition, and county officials are considering, among other preliminary funding ideas, another bond issue, for up to $500 million, to pay for a variety of projects, including parks."

Wis. sentencing law costly

Mary Zahn and Gina Barton of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel used state prison and court records to show that "a state law that gives criminals virtually no chance for early release will cost Wisconsin taxpayers an estimated $1.8 billion for inmates admitted through 2025 if current trends continue." The law, known as truth in sentencing, requires inmates to serve every day of their sentences, with no time off for good behavior. "The law will cost taxpayers an estimated $398 million extra just for the inmates who have entered the system in the first 4 1/2 years under truth in sentencing, as the time they would have been released under the old system comes and goes."

Many nursing home deaths preventable

Brad Heath of The Detroit News used data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to show that "nationwide, malnutrition and dehydration killed at least 13,890 nursing home patients — including more than 800 in Michigan — between 1999 and 2002, the most recent year for which numbers are available." Experts said that while not all of those deaths could have been prevented, at least some of them could have. "'Obviously, we're all going to die at some point. But people should not be dying of malnutrition or dehydration,' said Jeanie Kayser-Jones, a professor of nursing at the University of California San Francisco and one of a few researchers to study malnutrition in nursing homes. 'It's really neglect, and we should call it what it is.'"

Fla. voting rights restored unevenly

Debbie Cenziper and Jason Grotto of The Miami Herald, continuing their investigation of Florida's clemency system, reported that the state's Clemency Board "has restored voting rights to murderers, rapists, batterers, drug traffickers and corrupt public officials — at the same time it barred thousands of lower-level criminals from the polls." The paper identified at least 400 felons released from custody between 2001 and 2003 who had their civil rights restored even though they appeared ineligible under the state's clemency rules. Dozens were convicted of violent crimes, such as battery on a police officer, arson, armed robbery.

Shelter violates own policy on pet euthanization

Kim Bell, Michael D. Sorkin and Elizabethe Holland of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reviewed state records to find that "the kill rate at the Humane Society of Missouri is the highest for any major shelter in the region that's not operated by a city or county." Fifty-five percent of the animals brought to the society's St. Louis facility are euthanized, and the paper found that the Humane Society has violated its own policy on waiting 24 hours to kill animals dropped off in case owners change their minds.