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Schwarzenegger’s plan
to
audit California
State government for waste. “Dang,'' you can almost hear
Gray Davis swearing. "Why didn't we think of
that?'' she wrote sarcastically.
She enjoyed a good laugh over the
Schwarzenegger plan with Governor Warner:
“I
only wish it was so easy to find the part of the
budget that says, `here's the waste,' ''chuckled
Warner in a telephone interview. "Believe me,
it's not that easy. Every time I drive by a DMV
office I'm reminded of that.''
The
real chuckles here are Edds’ denial of waste and
Warner’s faulty lesson learned.
Schwarzenegger is unlikely to utilize
laid-off Arthur Andersen auditors who worked with
Enron to find waste.
Any knowledgeable auditor could undoubtedly
walk into California
or Virginia
State offices and find top-heavy staffing, questionable
purchases, excessive travel, and lax management.
Cutting that kind of waste would not take
milk from children’s mouths.
Gov. Warner did not cut waste at the DMV; he
made politically clumsy cuts to demonstrate that
budget cutting inflicts pain, hoping citizens would
rise up and demand higher taxes.
Instead, they rose up and demanded access to
services that the state mandates they purchase.
Kerry
Dougherty of the Pilot revisited those
DMV days, claiming she was ready to recall Gov.
Warner after a visit to one of those “gothic”
offices. She
cheered a Virginia
Beach
plan to extend DMV services.
Over at the Daily Progress, Bob
Gibson was more charitable toward Schwarzenegger
than Edds:
His
Republican team of advisers must be fashioning a
plan of a thousand cuts that people eventually will
feel. If they employ more fairness than smoke and
credit cards as they slash away, the new governor
will gain some stature in his new chosen profession
- acting gubernatorial.
Writing
in the Washington Post, Gordon
Morse defended the spending of public officials
at conferences such as the Virginia Municipal League
convention. The
poor souls suffer “enough malarkey” without
their spending habits at resorts being questioned by
impertinent newspapers, according to Morse.
While attending conventions, they
talk
about sewage and zoning, compare notes on planning
and occasionally join in small groups to pray that
someone, anyone, in the state capital gets serious
about tax reform.
They
also walk past the many state agency exhibit booths
and the state employees who staff them, oblivious to
another layer of charges to the taxpayer. What Morse and other defenders of this kind
of spending fail to grasp are the pernicious effects
it has on respect for lean, efficient government.
It’s hard to demand frugality from staff
when submitting an expense report from the
Homestead.
Heaven forbid a public official call or email an
official in another county to compare notes on
zoning. It’s
much easier to discuss such important matters on the
golf course.
In
the Roanoke Times, writer Josh
Humphries challenged the agenda of a conference
heavily attended by government officials at
taxpayers’ expense. The Commonwealth
of Virginia's
Information Technology Symposium held recently at
the Hotel Roanoke failed to debate critical issues,
leaving him “speechless.”
It also failed to involve ordinary local
citizens:
The
lack of an open forum - welcoming everyone affected
by this event - to this event is disturbing. Not
only because it's stuck in an old paradigm of
business development, one reminiscent of railroads,
coal mines and steel mills, but also because it
leaves out the people who will bring about this
technological revolution long ballyhooed by the
business barons and political pundits, those who
build it with their hands and those who consume its
products with their dollars.
But
then again, I might be overstating the role of this
conference. Perhaps it was just a chance for the
movers and shakers to rub elbows and not make any
profound changes in policy.
First,
conventions cost too much, then they produce too
little. What’s
a mover and shaker to do?
Baseball
Very Bad for Me
In
the continuing assault on bringing a major league
baseball franchise to Northern Virginia, Doug
Bandow of the Cato Institute, writing in the Washington
Post, took a shot at movers and shakers:
Neither
sports boosters nor their political allies are much
interested in overall economic impact. Fans want a
team, potential franchise owners desire subsidies,
and elected officials expect political gain -- and
the opportunity to snag an invitation to the owner's
box. Government stadiums benefit economic and
political elites, not the public.
Pay
No Attention to that Surplus
Susie
Dorsey of the Daily Press wasn’t
impressed by small surplus registered by the
Commonwealth at the end of the fiscal year.
She chided Republican candidates in the fall
election (Yes, Virginia, there is an election in
November) for using the surplus to cement their no
tax increase pledge. She
disputed their optimism about the state’s revenue
problems, but was strangely silent on the same
optimism emanating from the Warner Administration.
Ghost
Fleet Profiteering
The
“Ghost Fleet,” aging ships anchored on the James
River, have temporarily replaced out-of-state
garbage as the top Virginia environmental issue.
Michael
Town, Director of the Virginia Chapter of the
Sierra Club, offered a detailed critique in the Richmond
Times-Dispatch of the deal with foreign firms
that will remove the ships.
One of his more disturbing charges was that a
Virginia company bid for the job at almost half-million
dollars less than the successful award.
Tech
Defender Strikes Back
Dave
Moran, producer of the Blacksburg FM radio show
“Tech Talk,” changed the subject on Del. Robert
Marshall, R, Manassas.
Marshall had strenuously criticized Virginia
Tech for allowing a televised sex show. “I guess a
student-run television show is more important than
the rapidly declining state of education,” Moran
wrote in the Roanoke Times.
He blamed Marshall for “an effort to
appease the selfish voters of Virginia” and
accused him of “play[ing] with the misinformed
masses.”
Best
Line of the Week
The
Richmond Times-Dispatch’s A.
Barton Hinkle had the funniest line of the week:
Henrico
[County] fought, and won, a lengthy battle against the Gold City Showgirls girly
bar - thereby preserving the genteel character of
the nearby gas station, auto-parts store, and
trailer park.
--
October 20, 2003
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