Using taxpayers' money after his defeat in the 2006 election, former state Rep. Mike Veon,D-Beaver, apparently was in a generous mood. As part of the state attorney general's investigation into year-end bonuses in the General Assembly, it's been revealed that following his defeat at the polls, Veon handed out about $80,000 in bonuses to 13 staffers.

Veon's largess is likely tied to the fact that he was handing out taxpayers' money, not his own. Now working as a lobbyist in Harrisburg, it might be interesting to see if Veon is equally generous this holiday season, now that he would have to spend his own firm's money to pay bonuses.

One Veon aide, who received a $10,065 bonus, left his job in Veon's office to spend three months last year working for the House Demo-cratic Campaign Committee doing election work.

The largest Veon bonus check ($20,380) went to a staffer in his Beaver Falls office who also worked for the Beaver Initiative for Growth (BIG), Veon's pet nonprofit, which received nearly $11 million in state grants — and has since shut down. BIG was formed by Veon and state Sen. Gerald LaValle, another powerful lawmaker from Beaver. For years, Veon and LaValle were the only members of BIG's board and, as such, they controlled how millions of dollars in state grants were spent.

The ongoing investigation into legislative bonuses continues to raise two disturbing issues: Party leaders in Harrisburg, particularly Demo-crats in the House, appear to have rewarded staffers with taxpayer-funded bonuses for campaign work, which is illegal. And the generosity of the bonuses is more than likely linked to the ability of politicians to spend other people's money. Party leaders in Harrisburg appear to have bolstered their re-election campaigns by spreading around taxpayer money as if it were Monopoly money.

The $1.9 million that House Democrats paid out in year-end staff bonuses is providing plenty of material for Attorney General Tom Corbett's investigation. The 2006 bonuses to staffers were four times larger than the bonuses paid by House Democrats in 2005, a non-election year.

The legislative bonuses in general, and Veon's bonus payments in particular, reveal how some incumbent politicians treat taxpayer funds as their own, and use those funds to fund their re-election efforts.

When the investigation into the eye-popping legislative bonuses ends, presumably with indictments, probes should be launched into nonprofit agencies created by, or with close ties to, elected officials.

Three examples of such questionable relationships have been highlighted in the past year. The most recent is the connection between Veon, LaValle and BIG. On the other side of the state, a federal indictment against state Sen. Vincent Fumo alleges that he not only misappropriated an estimated $1 million of state taxpayer dollars for his personal and political use, but he also is charged with defrauding the Citizens Alliance for Better Neighborhoods, a nonprofit he created that was headed by a former staffer, by using the non-profit's workers and resources for his personal benefit.

At the federal level, there is increasing scrutiny of several nonprofit organizations with close ties to U.S. Rep. John Murtha. More attention is being focused on how money flows from the powerful Democrat and chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense to a small group of nonprofit organizations and defense contractors in the Johnstown area as well as to two major lobbying firms with close ties to Murtha.

In each of these cases, taxpayers deserve to know how the money is directed to the favored nonprofits and how it is spent.

Questionable legislative bonuses and preferred government funding to nonprofits with close ties to powerful lawmakers reveal troubling patterns involving the power of entrenched politicians and the free flow of taxpayers' dollars for projects that are economically questionable, but politically useful.

It has to stop — and the Bonusgate investigation (and probable indictments) should help.