On The Money: Wastebook 2010

By Mike Luery

SACRAMENTO (CBS13) -- A new study shines the spotlight on millions of dollars in wasteful government spending that includes some targets here in California.

U.S. Senator Tom Coburn, a Republican from Oklahoma is the author of "Wastebook 2010". Coburn says with America drowning in debt, taxpayers should not be forking out more money for what he considers frivolous projects, including the study of a popular video game, World of Warcraft.

Gamers, including Ozzie Osbourne may love the World of Warcraft, but taxpayers shelled out big bucks ($100,007 Coburn says) for a UC Irvine professor to study how players engage in creative collaboration. Then there was additional research to see how organizations could use the game to compete more effectively in the marketplace. The total cost: $2.9 million, according to Senator Coburn.

In response, UC Irvine says being on the list is "a sign of distinction and a compliment. They absolutely don't get what we're doing,' noted Walt Scacchi, a senior research scientist for UCI at the Institute for Software Research.

UC Irvine says computer games are the new media for the 21st Century – and the school is on the forefront of what be the biggest innovation in the next decade.

(Click here for UC Irvine statement)

But the music of previous decades is also creating controversy. UC Santa Cruz is archiving the music and memorabilia of the Grateful Dead,  one of the most influential rock bands ever. The school used $615,000 in federal funds to digitize materials from the band for the UC Santa Cruz library.

Senator Coburn calls it wasteful. The school says there is immense international interest in the band's cultural legacy and the money will help "create a new model for Web-based archives" that will be easily accessible for people worldwide.

(Click here to read more from UC Santa Cruz)

UC Santa Cruz also sent this link to the Dead's Archive page on Facebook, showing more than 50,000 followers:

The Senator's report also blasts the Internal Revenue Service for paying out $112 million to prisoners who filed fraudulent returns. The IRS says tracking prison fraud is not a simple process since the inmate population is constantly changing.

Other highlights from Senator Coburn's report:

*The Department of Veterans Affairs spends $175 million every year to maintain hundreds of buildings it does not use, including a pink, octagonal monkey house in Dayton, Ohio.

*Medicare paid out more than $35 million to 118 "phantom" medical clinics, allegedly set up by gang members to submit phony reimbursement claims.

*The National Science Foundation provided more than $200,000 to study why political candidates make vague statements.

If you see examples of wasteful government spending, send us an e-mail to onthemoney@kovr.com. You can also follow On The Money stories in progress at http://twitter.com/#!/mikeluery