PITTSBURGH -- State Auditor General Jack Wagner blasted management at the Port Authority of Allegheny County again on Thursday, accusing it of wasteful spending on executive benefits.

Channel 4 Action News reporter Bob Mayo said Wagner is calling for big changes in who oversees Port Authority management.

The Port Authority is already struggling with an anticipated $80 million budget shortfall. Major cuts in bus service are planned.

To provide more accountability, the state should start appointing much of the Port Authority board, Wagner said.

An ongoing audit shows the Port Authority is continuing to waste taxpayer money, even in the face of its money problems, Wagner said.

"We feel that there is a management crisis at the Port Authority," Wagner said.

Taxpayers and transit riders have paid -- and are paying -- several hundred thousand dollars in benefits to former Port Authority CEO Paul Skoutelas, Wagner said.

"It's far worse than what everyone thought it was," Wagner said.

Current CEO Steve Bland got $45,000 to pay for his move to Pittsburgh last June, and he got nearly $7,000 to buy back vacation time after being on the job only six months, Wagner said.

"It is waste. It is bad decisions. It is taxpayer dollars and fare dollars that should have never been spent," Wagner said.

The state provides more than half of Allegheny County's transit funding and should have control of four of the nine appointments to the Port Authority board, Wagner said.

"There needs to be a change in culture at the highest levels of this organization, where we believe a management crisis continues to exist," he said.

In response, Bland said the provisions Wagner cited were approved by previous boards, and the current board is expected to abolish them for future management retirees.

Bland said his own relocation costs were "a conservative estimate agreed upon by all parties."

The county's chief executive appoints all nine people on the Port Authority board. Instead, Wagner wants the governor to appoint two, and a leader in the state House and in the state Senate to appoint one each.

That change would require a vote by state lawmakers.

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