Education Department's Paris Attaché

A true story, copied from the New York Times:

May 7, 2009, 4:49 pm

Attaché No. 9
By Brian Knowlton
As Obama administration budget-cutters pored over thousands of pages of documents in search of meaningful reductions, it appears that only one job – as opposed to a full-fledged program – caught their attention: that of a Paris-based education attaché coordinating with UNESCO.

The position apparently fell well short, in administration eyes, of justifying its rather hefty price tag: nearly $632,000 a year. So much so that President Obama saw fit to mention it, along with only a few other tax-cutting targets, during brief remarks at the White House on Thursday.

It is no surprise that the costs of keeping executive-level employees in a city like Paris are hardly negligible. But as it turns out, the $632,000 represents not just the costs incurred by the last holder of the job, one Sally Lovejoy, but also a projection of what it would have cost to replace her.

As a senior civil servant, Ms. Lovejoy’s base salary and benefits were $154,819, according to the Education Department. On top of that, she received “post-differential pay” — because of the high cost of living in Paris – of $29,653. She also received $77,650 for apartment rental, and was reimbursed $21,259 for travel costs.

Her share of the U.S. mission’s “administrative support costs” was $137,776. Then throw in $3,397 for parking, and add $1,529 for storage of household goods.

If those numbers – totaling $429,054 – come a long way from the $632,000 that Mr. Obama mentioned, it is because the administration was also including the costs of moving a new attaché to Paris, bringing him or her up to speed in French (assuming this was necessary), and subsidizing the schooling of two (presumed) children.

The position has been vacant since year-end, when Ms. Lovejoy, who previously worked on education issues for years in Congress, left Paris. She was the second person to hold the position since the United States decided in 2002 to re-enter UNESCO (after an 18-year absence that began under President Reagan).

Thus, on top of the $429,054 spent to keep Ms. Lovejoy in Paris, the Education Department estimated moving expenses for a replacement at $60,000, plus an airline ticket at $2,500. Education costs were put at $30,000 for each of the two (presumed) children, and language studies at $5,000.

Administrative support costs were expected to rise by $40,000 in the 2009 fiscal year.

And additional support staff was estimated to cost $35,000 — for a grand total of $631,554.

The web site of the U.S. delegation to UNESCO indicates that it now includes five positions, including a science attaché – but no education attaché – though education is the largest component of UNESCO’s work.

John McGrath, an Education Department spokesman, said that the attache’s responsibility included working on education policy issues at UNESCO and “representing the United States in education functions.”

Asked how common it was for a big industrialized country like the United States to go without an education attaché to UNESCO, Sue Williams, a spokeswoman for the international organization in Paris, said that “not all industrialized nations have education attaches in the delegations.” Each delegation, she noted, organizes itself as it desires.

And each government, of course, makes the cuts that it deems necessary.

There have got to be dozens of these kinds of positions in government that could be cut. This is ridiculous. I'm not saying that there wouldn't be good reasons to liaise with UNESCO on global education issues. But this couldn't be done by someone on the staff of the U.S. delegation to the United Nations? Come on.