footing the bill

Tom Wheeler, executive director of the Environmental Protection Information Center, which supports tamping down the barred owl population, said it wouldn’t just be the federal government footing the bill.

Ultimately it is they who are footing the bill - and will continue to do so.

"We're going to get a lot of money in the future, and I think that's appropriate, because we have taxpayers that shouldn't be footing the bill," he said.

It will cost farmers nothing to get their animals vaccinated as the government says it is footing the bill.

But it was the department’s payroll that was footing the bill — her unknowing grandmother was, authorities said.