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Links:Links pageRSSRIPR is primarily a print publication (yikes! how 20th century!), and the work it represents is supported by its subscribers. Feel free to use this link to an RSS feed for the blog, but the real meat is in the newsletter, so come back and subscribe when you have a chance. Responsibility: Tom Sgouros
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Tue, 04 Dec 2007
[Appeared last week in the Woonsocket Call and Pawtucket Times and other fine RIMG papers.]
All the leaves are brown and the sky is grey, and I have Governor Carcieri's staff reduction plans to evaluate. We finally learned last week that the Governor's proposed job cuts will not all be in invisible "back office" positions. It turns out that he's not only talking about middle managers, but about front-line state employees: translators, janitors, cooks, nurses, social workers and many more.
As you look over the list, you do get the feeling that many of these jobs are, indeed, overdue for reconsideration. Why, for example, does the taxation division need both a Director and an Executive Administrator? The Director is on the chopping block, and perhaps that's just as well.
On the other hand, reading the list also tells you that the $41 million in savings the Governor is claiming simply won't happen. I see several lawyers in Human Services (DHS) who are due to be cut. Will anyone bet against me that those salaries won't be replaced by payments to $300-an-hour law firms? We've also heard about the Cambodian, Hmong and Portuguese translators to be laid off from DHS. But Hmong speakers are still going to come to DHS for help, and someone is going to have to translate for them. The Governor's proposal is to rely on those people's children, but it's hard to imagine that no money will be spent on translation services.
On the list I also see what seems like the entire kitchen staff at Zambarano and Eleanor Slater Hospitals. Oddly, this sounds just like the (unsuccessful) proposal he made earlier this year to privatize those services. You may think this is a good idea, or you may not, but either way, you have to be skeptical of anyone who claimed all their salaries as savings. Does the Governor imagine that some private contractor will cook for the state's patients for free? If he does, it might explain why he's so enthusiastic about privatizing services. I hope someone breaks it to him gently.
The truth is that privatizing is not a sure-fire way to cut costs. Contractors are sometimes cheaper than state employees, but not always, and there are frequently significant costs to contracting that never get counted. DHS is on the hook for about $5 million a year to Northrop Grumman these days because years ago the department made a choice to rely on contractors to maintain the computer system that pays state welfare checks. The system was written in an obscure database language, and Northrop now has most of the remaining experts in that language on their staff, so we are stuck with them until we ditch the whole thing. Had we made a different decision back then, we'd be paying far less to maintain the system today.
There are other problems, too. Rising pension payments are one of the real problems in state and local budgets. Several hundred fewer people paying into the system isn't going to make it cheaper for those who remain. And we haven't even gotten to the bumping and seniority issues. We are facing a $400 million deficit next year, and the Governor offers us a $41 million cut that is really just a fraction of that. He says he'll make it add to $100 million with cuts in employee benefits, but so far it seem like just budgetary dreamin'.
Where will the balance come from? Not taxes, or so says Carcieri. In speeches and interviews lately, he's been making much of "those who would raise your taxes." But who are these unnamed people? The Poverty Institute, not exactly a power center, but probably the most prominent statewide advocacy group for social services, is this year only proposing rolling back a couple of the tax cuts granted over the last few years. I've heard no member of the General Assembly speak in favor of raising taxes, and to the amazement of those with fingers to count on, the Assembly leadership remains committed -- at least in public -- to cutting taxes on the rich even more. As I've written before, I happen to think it would be a dandy idea to address some of the injustices perpetrated by the last few years of tax cuts for the rich and tax hikes for everyone else, so maybe he means me.
If so, it's kind of flattering, really, but who knew responsibility could be so lonely? The crazy thing about the state budget crisis these days is that it sometimes seems like there is no one on the side of paying for state services with, you know, revenues. Once upon a time, this was thought to be a hallmark of serious discussion about government, but in our modern tax-cut-happy world, that kind of talk is simply not the done thing.
The Governor is right about one thing: There really is a dark and malignant force moving stealthily across the political landscape this year. A spectre is haunting Rhode Island -- the spectre of arithmetic. Eventually, he and the Assembly are going to have to make things add up. Let's all hope for a bit less dreaming when that day comes.
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