INDIANAPOLIS – A new report from the Indianapolis Star reveals taxpayers funded $343,490 in out-of-state trips for Indiana legislators over the past two years.
The article noted Rep. Randy Frye (R-Greensburg) spent $5,602 on three American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) conferences and two clean transportation forums.
Twenty-five additional Indiana lawmakers attended ALEC conferences, which work to advance limited government through a nonpartisan public-private partnership of state legislators, members of the private sector and the general public.
Frye has also been a proponent of natural gas legislation in Indiana, which he attended two conferences.
“We have two separate pieces of legislation, one passed in 2013, the other in 2014, dealing with alternative fuel vehicles,” Frye continues. “That information is not something I had when I was elected. I have studied and had to research it, certainly here in Indiana but also in other areas.”
The lawmaker said he also attended two other alternative fuel forums in Kansas City and Atlanta, which he paid for travel expenses out of pocket.
“I am certainly not going to be traveling on the taxpayer’s dime just to go on a vacation or play golf somewhere. That’s not what I do. I go to get the information,” Frye says.
Frye added that conferences are a distraction and takes time away he would rather be spending with family, “I don’t go to conferences just to be going.”
According to the newspaper, Rep. Jud McMillin (R-Brookville) spent $2,791 on two trips to legislative conferences. Cindy Ziemke (R-Batesville) spent $2,248 traveling to Washington, D.C. for an ALEC conference.
Sen Jean Leising (R-Oldenburg) used $1,145 for travel expenses to D.C. for an ALEC meeting.
Senate President Pro Tempore David Long, R-Fort Wayne, said he limits travel for senators to once a year.
House members are allowed one fully paid educational trip each year, the newspaper reports
