GSA Whistleblower’s Exit

Seemingly minutes after the scandal broke in April 2012 over lavish conference spending at the General Services Administration, several top GSA executives were forced out. Now, one could say, the circle has been completed with the announcement Tuesday of the impending retirement of GSA Deputy Administrator Susan Brita. 

She’s the former congressional staffer, scandal-watchers will recall, who came over to GSA and disapproved of fancy hotel suites, fine dining and entertainment by mind-readers that some members of the Public Buildings Service procured for hundreds of employees in Las Vegas in 2010. Brita alerted the inspector general, who began what became an explosive probe. 

GSA Administrator Dan Tangherlini, in an agency-wide e-mail on Tuesday announcing several departures, said that “2014 begins on a bittersweet note as GSA will be losing one of our most dedicated employees, Deputy Administrator Susan Brita.”   

He detailed Brita’s career that began at GSA in 1985, when she spent three years as chief of staff to then-Administrator Terence Golden. Beginning in 1992, she was staff director for a House Transportation and Infrastructure subcommittee dealing with public buildings, and in February 2010 President Obama appointed her GSA deputy administrator.

Though Tangherlini did not reference the scandal, he said Brita, who retires in March, “has worked to make GSA as efficient and effective as possible. Her commitment to the highest standards of public service have helped strengthen this agency and will serve as an example for everyone who works here for years to come.”

(Image via Andrei Kuzmik/Shutterstock.com)