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Prince George's Taxpayers Pick Up Officials' Personal Tabs
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"I didn't even know it was a lingerie place," said Harrington, who is a nondenominational minister. "In the back, you could see mannequins wearing the clergy shirt."
He said he did not have cash to buy the shirt and was told the store was going out of business that day. So he pulled out his county-issued credit card and billed it to taxpayers.
"I said, 'Let me do this this one time,' " he recalled. "It was just a last-minute thing. It wasn't tawdry or anything."
Since January 2003, Harrington has charged more than $27,200 to his county-issued credit card, including dry cleaning, video rentals and a round-trip airline ticket for his son, Stephen, to fly home from Morehouse College in Atlanta last year for Thanksgiving.
Around that time, Harrington charged a second ticket to the county for his son to come home again.
"I got a call from my son saying 'Hey, Dad, where's my plane ticket?' I said 'oops' and I get on the Internet and get his ticket," Harrington said. "I didn't have my other credit card on me."
County officials said Harrington repaid the plane tickets, but they did not provide receipts or canceled checks.
Harrington has not repaid $1,200 he charged in January 2005 for four six-month gym memberships at the county's Sports & Learning Complex for himself and three staff members.
"In lieu of bonuses, I gave them the memberships," he said.
He also has not reimbursed the county for a $62.89 prescription drug charge from Kaiser Permanente in Annapolis last April.
"The charge was more than the money I had on me," he said. "I don't want to give the impression that I'm using the card willy-nilly. I take the taxes of people very, very seriously."
Camille Exum
Exum does not like small planes, so when she attended a government conference in Monterey, Calif., in June 2005, she flew into San Francisco. After an overnight stay at a Westin hotel that cost $718 for herself and an aide, she rented a chauffeur-driven limousine for $375 to take them and another council member to the conference, a two-hour trip.
