Gus Bilirakis is Exercised Over Gitmo's $1 Million Recreation Complex

Rep. Gus Bilirakis, R-Palm Harbor, says he is "outraged" over the apparent use of taxpayer money to provide Guantanamo Bay detainees with a "state of the art" soccer field and exercise facilities.

America is in a fiscal crisis and this is a time in which every taxpayer dollar must be used efficiently and effectively. This certainly is not the best use of those dollars, said Bilirakis, a member of the House Homeland Security Committee.

Department of Defense dollars should be used to protect our nation, not to entertain detainees.

Bilirakis on Wednesday sent a letter to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta questioning the decision to spend $744,000 for the soccer field and up to hundreds of thousands more for related recreational facilities.

In the letter, Bilirakis challenges Panetta:

"While the administration's recent proposal for its fiscal year 2012 defense budget reflects a reduction in military spending ... it is curious that the federal government has managed to spend nearly a million taxpayer dollars for the comfort and relaxation of detainees who are accused of posing a real risk of injury to our country and people.

"At best, construction of a new recreation facility appears incredibly tone deaf."

Bilirakis spokesman Creighton Welch said the congressman is awaiting answers to several questions posed to Panetta, including, "What was the impetus for the construction of the new recreation facility? And what authority approved its construction?"