Latest Steele Hire Bilked DC Group for $70K

Under fire for recent flaps over RNC spending, Chairman Michael Steele has hired a new “special assistant for finance”—and possibly walked into another gaffe. Neil S. Alpert, the 31-year-old wunderkind whose new job it will be to “help raise money” and “find new funds,” according to a spokesman, has done that before, for a DC baseball PAC. Problem is, according to a ruling, he also spent that money surreptitiously, to the tune of $70,000.

Alpert was ordered by the city to repay the money, which it says he spent on rent, restaurants, and parking, and to fork over a $4,000 fine. He paid the latter, Politics Daily reports, but he never came up with the $70,000 that board members say was intended to give opportunities to inner-city youth. “His expenses were beyond excessive. They were grandiose,” says one. Another interested party had this to say of Alpert’s new gig with Steele: “They both deserve each other.” (More Michael Steele stories.)