WASHINGTON - Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa has asked the top watchdog of stimulus money whether the office received any indications of problems regarding now-defunct energy company Solyndra and whether the watchdog office plans to take any action going forward to try to account for the $528 million in stimulus funds awarded to the company and now lost.
"The stimulus funds always needed aggressive oversight," Grassley said. "Whenever tax money goes out, especially in the billions of dollars, there's tremendous potential for waste, fraud and abuse without checks and balances. The stimulus oversight office should do everything it can to fill in the knowledge gaps regarding what happened to the $528 million in stimulus funds given to Solyndra."
Grassley wrote to the chairman of the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, which oversees the implementation of the $787 billion economic stimulus package signed into law by President Obama in February 2009. Grassley has worked to ensure the board's independence as he has raised specific projects to the board's attention, including stimulus funds misused by the Philadelphia Housing Authority.
The text of Grassley's letter on Solyndra is available here.
