Senator wants answers on Afghanistan project

Consider paying $60 million to turn on the power, then paying another nearly $100,000 to make sure no one flips the switch … all courtesy of American taxpayers.

Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill, a former state auditor who ran a committee investigating wartime contracting abuse, has seen plenty. But she claims to have never seen anything like this.

“Taxpayers spending tens of millions of dollars on a program halfway around the world that didn’t work, then another $98,000 to make sure it didn’t work, is a new one,” she said.

The Democratic lawmaker said that about a recent inspector general report that detailed an electrical transmission project in Afghanistan whose safety concerns led to an additional expenditure to keep the Afghan government from employing the system.

In a letter to Lt. General Todd Semonite, the commander and chief engineer of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, McCaskill sought answers about the decision-making that led to the still-inactive system and the steps being planned to mitigate the problems.

“Even though the transmission lines were completed five months ago, they have never been operational,” the letter said, “and it is unclear when, or whether, they ever will be.”

Reconstruction of Afghanistan infrastructure stood as one component of the war in that country. The third phase of the North East Power System meant to bring electricity to one million residents in the northern provinces.

A contract got awarded for Phase III in September 2013. Targeted to begin carrying power by January 2016, the project got completed 22 months behind schedule.

In addition, the project team spent five years making no headway on acquiring the property through which the transmission wires run. The Corps authorized the construction despite this.

Since private homes stand beneath the wires, the Corps deemed it unsafe to energize the system, paying the additional money to keep it disabled.

McCaskill voiced her frustration with those who managed the project.

“Most of the rural residents in my state don’t have broadband access. First responders and community organizations don’t have the resources they need to combat the opioid epidemic,” the senator said.

“But rather than use $60 million to help solve these or other pressing problems, we spent it doing literally nothing.”

The Missourian sits as the top Democrat on the Senate Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs Committee.