City council members Jan Drago and Richard McIver—both of whom are retiring when their terms run out in November—are headed for Dubai and Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, this week as part of an 85-person trade mission for the Trade Development Alliance of Greater Seattle. McIver's flight, hotel, and other expenses will cost the city $7,595; Drago's will cost somewhat less, $6,286, because she found a ticket herself and will share a room. Both of the council members' trips were planned last year and paid for out of the council members' office budgets for 2008.

Drago's office says missions like the one to Dubai are worthwhile because they enable participants to build relationships with officials in other cities and can create financial benefits for Northwest companies. For example, her office says, the most recent trip Drago took—to Chongqing, China—resulted in a $30 million contract for the Robbins Company, a firm with an office in Kent that builds construction machines. Boeing, which is a sponsor of the trip, does business with two huge UAE-based airlines, Emirates and Etihad Airways. Other Northwest companies, including Microsoft and Starbucks, do business in Dubai.

Trade missions are common—council members go on them every year. It's the specifics of this junket that raise eyebrows. Spending thousands of dollars to send two council members to one of the most expensive places in the world during a severe recession may be a judgment call. However, choosing two council members who won't be around to implement any policy ideas they may learn about in the UAE, or to actually capitalize on any relationships they may form there, is a highly questionable use of public dollars.

At a time when council president Richard Conlin is freezing the council's travel budget for the rest of the year, and perhaps permanently, the image of council members jet- setting off to Dubai just months before they retire is more than a little unseemly.