Tim Burchett Asks How Much The Government Could Save By 'Allowing Unneeded Leases To Expire'

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At a House DOGE Committee hearing before the Congressional recess, Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN) spoke about office space leased by the federal government.

Transcript

00:00The gentleman yields. I now recognize Mr. Burchett from Tennessee.

00:05Thank you, Chair Lady. Thank you for indulgence in allowing me to be on this committee.

00:09I come in here usually ticked off and I leave in worse condition, so thank you for that.

00:16If I ever have a counselor, I'm going to send you the bill.

00:21Mr. Hart, do any members of Congress, their spouses, or their immediate family

00:27have any property ownership rights to this property or any federal land?

00:34Congressman, I don't know the answer to that question off the top of my head.

00:37Okay, do spouses of members of Congress own real property and lease it to the federal government?

00:42And how would we find that out? Because I think I know what you're going to say.

00:46I believe the answer to that question is yes.

00:49You do?

00:50I do believe that.

00:52Is there any way we could verify that information?

00:54Well, you go to USA Spending and search, open the books, our website,

00:59and you can look up members' names, you can look up any person's name,

01:03and find that information.

01:05All right. I suspect that's being done as I speak.

01:09Mr. Moroney, how much underutilized space does the federal government have?

01:15Can't say there's not good data. We just don't have data.

01:18It's going to come this summer. Congress has now required it.

01:20But prior to this, once you get outside of headquarters, there wasn't measurement of how much the...

01:25I hate these studies.

01:26Every day we vote on a new study, and I suspect there's some warehouse like in Raiders of the Lost Ark at the end

01:31where they're putting this, and our top people are looking at it,

01:34and there's these studies that are just on these shelves in these vast, vast warehouses.

01:39Would you agree with that assumption?

01:40There are a lot of studies.

01:42All right.

01:43Remember your... whatever.

01:44All right.

01:45How much would the federal government save by allowing unneeded leases to expire?

01:51Federal government sends about $6 billion on leased office space,

01:55so depending on how many you let expire, you get substantial savings.

02:00As I said up here, people chastised the thought of making a profit.

02:07To me, that's not an evil thing.

02:09That allows for more people to be employed.

02:11It seems that we have forgotten exactly who we work for,

02:17and it's the people back home who are struggling.

02:19When I was mayor of Knox County, one of the first things I did was I said,

02:23get me a list of all the property we own in Knox County.

02:28And it was amazing to me.

02:31I mean, we had property in neighborhoods.

02:34We had property...

02:34Some of it was obviously undevelopable.

02:37Someone was on the corner of a small airport.

02:39But it was all over.

02:42We had something listed as a park, and it was nothing further from a park.

02:47And we ended up selling a lot of this property, and we paid cash for schools,

02:52crazy things like that.

02:53We didn't stay in debt.

02:55And to me, that just seems like the model that the federal government should adopt.

03:00We should have a listing of the property,

03:02and the people ought to be able to review that and make better assumptions.

03:06Because I assume, I think they're a lot more smarter than we give them credit for.

03:11And I suspect that's part of the problem.

03:13They don't want to let them look behind the curtain, so to speak.

03:19Would you agree with that?

03:20It is important to have that kind of data.

03:22There is an inventory that's available online,

03:25but there are significant issues with this reliability.

03:29Mr. Hart, would you care to address that?

03:32We would like to enhance the transparency of all of that data.

03:35I think it's one of the most important assets that taxpayers should be able to review the cost

03:40so that they can make good decisions.

03:41And again, the purpose of transparency is to empower taxpayers.

03:45Transparency is not a two-way street.

03:48The government does not have the right to inspect our checkbook.

03:50Taxpayers do have the right to inspect the government's checkbook

03:53because it's their money.

03:56Mr. Kendall, would you care to offer your...

03:59I'm all in favor of transparency.

04:02No objection.

04:03It seems our friends in the media always strive for that.

04:08And we get pretty gutless up here.

04:13So I would hope in the future we would address that.

04:16I'll yield my 49 seconds back to you, Chair Lady.

04:19Thank you for your indulgence, ma'am.

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