Paper Chase: EPA report on Lakes cost $24,000 a page

Deb Price / The Detroit News

The paper

A 21-page report from the Environmental Protection Agency this month concludes that it could take 77 years and $3.3 billion to clean highly polluted areas of the Great Lakes.

The cost of the report with 16 pages of data: $381,379 (nearly $24,000 for each page), according to a letter from an inspector general. That amount was calculated by multiplying the project's staff days by the billing rates.

The chase

When Bill Roderick became acting inspector general of the EPA in 2006, he ordered that the price tag on IG reports be made public.

"As far as I know, we're the only IG office that lists the cost of our reports," spokesman John Manibusan said. "Bill Roderick wanted transparency, and since 2006, our report had listed the cost of the report."

Why it matters

The purpose of the federal government's 69 inspectors general is to "detect and prevent fraud, waste, abuse, and violations of law and to promote economy, efficiency and effectiveness in the operations of the Federal Government," according to the Council of Inspectors General Web site.

But spokesman Pete Sepp of the National Taxpayers Union questions why only one federal watchdog apparently tells how much it spends to produce its reports.

"The conclusion of this report -- that a federal agency isn't organized -- would seem to be pretty obvious about any program involving the federal government," Sepp said. "It'd be nice to know how much all of these reports are costing the taxpayer, so we could see what's worth it and whether we could do some of the work at less expense."