Travel privilege request turned down

Members of the House of Representatives yesterday refused to adopt a lawmaker’s request for a special travel privilege for the Legislature.

Rep. Absalon V. Waki Jr. authored a resolution asking that senators and representatives be issued 100 percent of the travel per diem allowance.

According to the Department of Finance’s policy, government officials and employees traveling on taxpayer funds initially get only 80 percent of the per diem allowance. The remaining 20 percent is reimbursed once they submit necessary travel vouchers and documentation.

Citing personal experience, Waki said that government travelers who have used their own money to cover expenses while on official business must wait months or sometimes years to collect the 20 percent per diem amount withheld by the Finance Department.

“Since the Commonwealth government’s per diem rates have remained unchanged while costs associated with official travel have increased, the withholding of any per diem funds from the traveler creates an undue hardship on the travelers,” Waki said in his resolution.

He argued that it was not necessary to withhold the 20 percent, as Finance could easily collect any amounts owed to the government by directly deducting those funds from the employee’s paycheck, if for example, a traveler cancels a trip or if the department inadvertently issued too much funds to the traveler.

However, his proposal was to waive the per diem withholding policy for the lawmakers only.

Waki’s request failed to gain support from any of the 12 other lawmakers present in yesterday’s House session.

“I don’t know if it will be prudent to request that the Legislature be given special benefit at a time when we are talking about austerity. Timing is critical her. This proposal is just a little bit too hard to swallow for me,” said Rep. Joseph Deleon Guerrero.

House Minority Leader Arnold Palacios maintained that there is a compelling reason the Finance Department does not pay 100 percent per diem up front. “There are a lot of cases where travelers don’t liquidate their travel expenses. I think it is good policy to withhold 20 percent until travel documentation requirements are satisfied,” he said.

Addressing Waki’s concern, Palacios added, “What we can do, rather than requesting for 100 percent per diem, is to talk to the Department of Finance as to how to expedite reimbursement after satisfaction of liquidation requirements.”

For his part, Rep. Stanley T. Torres offered Waki a piece of advice, “Use your credit card and you will get 100 percent reimbursement. That’s been done.”