Nevadan named new IG at U.S. printing office

Benjamin Grove

Friday, Dec. 3, 2004 | 9:47 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Former Nevada Assemblyman Greg Brower is the new inspector general at the U.S. Government Printing Office -- the fourth Nevadan to take a top job with the agency.

Brower, 40, who attended Bonanza High School in Las Vegas, will take over the post of inspector general at the agency responsible for printing all government documents.

This is Brower's first job in an inspector general post. Most federal agencies have an IG to act as a kind of internal affairs officer. The 26-member staff office is responsible for audits and investigations inside the agency aimed at improving efficiency and eliminating waste. Inspector general reports often spotlight agency shortcomings and failures in stark language.

The challenge of the job is working closely with agency chiefs while maintaining independence as a watchdog, Brower said.

"It's more than doable," he said.

Still, Brower said he has a big job at an agency undergoing an "overdue" transformation of a 3,500-employee, paper-printing bureaucracy dating to Benjamin Franklin into a modern digital-document house.

"It's a busy place," said Brower, who is still acclimating after about a month on the job. "So far, so good."

Brower most recently spent a year in the Justice Department as legislative counsel in the executive office for U.S. attorneys, where he managed congressional affairs for the nation's 93 U.S. attorneys serving in the states.

Brower has been a partner in the Nevada law firm Jones Vargas and was a two-term Nevada Assemblyman. He also served in the Navy.

Other Nevadans at GPO include agency chief Bruce James, of Crystal Bay at Lake Tahoe, who holds the same title that Benjamin Franklin once held -- public printer of the United States. James took the post in December 2002.

Frank Partlow of Reno is the special assistant to the public printer, and Veronica Meter of Las Vegas is director of GPO public relations.