Eight employees from the Environmental Protection Agency earned a total of ten years of paid "administrative leave" because they were involved in "cases of alleged serious misconduct,"
Fox News reported.
All of the eight staffers "were or are subject to a disciplinary process," an EPA official told Fox News, adding, "we cannot comment on the circumstances of their departure from the agency for those who are no longer employed by EPA."
The cases of administrative leave have been previously reported but Fox uncovered for the first time that they were
linked to misconduct after the network questioned the agency about the reason for the absences.
An EPA official said in an email to the network that the agency had "carefully exercised its discretion" in placing "certain employees" on the paid form of absence "in cases of alleged serious misconduct."
The nature of the alleged wrongdoings has not been revealed. In one case, there was a paid absence of three years. At least three employees have left the agency.
The cases which occurred between 2011 and 2014 were uncovered after a memo was sent from EPA's acting assistant administrator, Nanci Gelb, to EPA's inspector general, Arthur Elkins, outlining cases of administrative leave.
There is no indication about whether any of the allegations have been proven.
Over the three year period documented, employees on leave received a total of $1,096,000, for leave ranging from less than two months to up to three years, Fox News reported.
One of the staffers on leave also ran up more than seven months of additional absences, at a cost to the taxpayer of $57,636, which were charged as "dispute resolution" and "general labor management."
An EPA official said "federal regulations allow the use of these codes when an employee is involved in a dispute resolution and/or engaged in working with their union representative to work on their case," Fox News reported.
Earlier this year, a former EPA official, John Beale, was sentenced to prison for getting almost $1 million worth of paid time off by
concocting a story that he was a covert CIA officer, a story that went unchecked for years.
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