the official blog of the evergreen freedom foundation

Phantom Zip Codes follow on heels of phantom Congressional districts

Posted by Scott "The Piper" St. Clair - January 04, 2010

Nearly $3.5 million in federal stimulus spending has been attributed to Zip Codes in Washington state that either belong somewhere else or don't exist at all.
 
A Zip-Code-by-Zip-Code manual review of the 458 listed for Washington state at the federal government's Recovery.gov Web site disclosed 11 incorrect or non-existent codes. This works out to an error rate of 2.4 percent.
 
According to Recovery.gov, Washington state ranks third in the number of jobs created by stimulus spending. 34,517 jobs were created, the Web site claims, while the state has been awarded $5.4 billion and has received nearly $1.4 billion of the award.
 
Four of the Zip Codes belong somewhere other than Washington state. One is for an APO for military mail, and three others belong to Anchorage, Alaska, Glen Allen, Va., and Peabody, Mass., respectively.
 
Six Zip Codes are not attributable to any post office in the United States, although one, 91809, could be a Seattle code if the second and third numbers were transposed. Another, 09106, is similar to the Zip Code for Peabody, which is 01960. 
 
With over $2 million, Peabody received the lion's share of the nearly $3.5 million. Zip Code 09106 was reported to have received $25,314.
 
This official misreporting follows on the heels of the discovery of phantom Congressional districts that was reported at LibertyLive.org in November of last year. The phantom districts story started in New Mexico, and it spread around the country with investigative work and subsequent reporting done by state-based Watchdogs, a loosely-affiliated national group of journalists.
 
Similarly, the Zip Code story broke first in New Mexico. Reporters in other states are investigating and reporting on it in their states. In West Virginia, $28 million in stimulus funds went to bogus Zip Codes. Nebraska has also reported millions going to its own nonexistent codes.
 
At first blush, the numbers associated with the Zip Code errors don't approach the errors associated with the phantom Congressional districts. But the question remains where did the $3.5 million really go and on what was it spent?
 
Even numbers that appear to be correctly reported raise questions. For example, over $13 million went to Zip Code 99114 allegedly resulting in the creation of 39 jobs, which works out to nearly $336,000 per job. 99114 is Colville, Wash, in the remote north-central part of the state.
 
According to Recovery.gov, the Colville spending is in the form of several grants to area school districts and rural services agencies
 

Thoughts?   Add Comment -

Army Mom said on Jan 04 2010 at 4:59pm
...and these people want to run our health care?

Anni said on Jan 04 2010 at 6:08pm
Good work there Scottie..........you "the man". Go get 'em.

Trice753 said on Jan 06 2010 at 7:01pm
Oh my! Makes you wonder who is running America..

Ron S. said on Jan 06 2010 at 7:32pm
Are the Republicans or at least the Conservatives going to investigate these district and zip code discrepancies, and determine where the moneys that were to go to these bogus districts and zip codes really went to and what specific projects they were spent on?

Ron S. said on Jan 06 2010 at 7:35pm
Will the people resonsible for these obvious deliberate discrepancies be brought to justice, fined and inprisoned for their misappropriations of our tax payers money we paid in taxes?

Jim Copeland said on Jan 07 2010 at 11:57am
The big question here is , where will this unaccounted for money end up. Might I suggest that it could well turn up in the form campaign support for Democrats in 2010 and in the form of voter fraud of all kinds that would inevitably be connected to ACORN and it's affilliates. With the national uprising of conservatives evident to the left, you can bet they are planning their strategy for winning in November. They have always been given to cheating. This year will be no different.

www.jimcopelan.com
253-566-4200

Ohoi Zip Code said on May 21 2010 at 3:28pm
I agree with you Trice753. It does kinda make you wonder who is running the America. These people are outrageous.