Getting It Right-Suffering from Bureaucratic Overload!!

August 2, 2007

By: Sid Riley

This column presents a non-partisan, conservative viewpoint about items of interest in our community and our lives. Focus is on items that are impacting your pocket book, your personal freedoms, and your rights. I hope that you will read the column regularly and that it occasionally influences your opinions and actions. Now, on to the subject of the week:
I have been so physically ill the past few days that I feared I would be unable to write my column this week. I fear that I am suffering from "bureaucratic overload".
I have always been aware of how the budgeting process worked, and through the years may have spent a small amount of time actually attending budget related meetings. However, since I have become involved with the management of this newspaper, and am thus forced to be involved in the gathering of news stories for publication, this year I was thrust into hours of attendance of the budget meetings for the county as they prepared next year’s budget.
I was given a "press packet" which the clerk for the commissioners had thankfully prepared to assist in following the processes. This was essentially the same workbook that each commissioner used. I should have known I was in physical peril when I saw that the book’s thickness rivaled that of a large Bible.
Then the process began. The five commissioners sit at their lofty, official podium as each department representative is scheduled to appear before them to review the "wish list" for expansion and improvement of their department. They have all worked diligently in preparation for this presentation that shows how cleverly they were able to spend all of they tax money they were allocated this year, and how badly they need more next year.
Needs for additional staff members, raise requests, position upgrades, new and more vehicles, new equipment, office space, heavy unbearable workloads, overtime requirements, inability to find good candidates for job openings, lack of supplemental funding, and a flood of other arguments, excuses, and projections are presented. All of this is done with a serious, straight face.
The commissioners listen compassionately, occasionally asking a question. Twelve new cars for the sheriff’s department , additional deputies, a new Tourism Director position request, a $120,000 shortfall in library funding because of state reductions, worn out graders, new "inspect-a-crats" for the ever expanding building inspection department, fire trucks and ambulances, pole barns and office space, are all tearfully justified.
I think my illness peaked when the commissioners began discussing pay raises. How to deal with the poor County Engineer who was hired two weeks before the raises for last year were given, so that he thus was omitted from that raise and had to survive all year on just his $94,000 salary. They decided to double his raise this year to make up for it, giving him a salary of $99,000 in the coming year.
The normal 3% raise didn’t seem to be enough this year. It appears that the commissioners are going to go far beyond that this year in their benevolence to the 332 bureaucrats in their domain. They are trying to give a 5% raise because of the cost of living going up so much. They failed to mention that one of the major items of increased costs is the cost of taxes, which is caused in part by commissioners granting 5% raises.
Of course each year the raises are compounded, 103% X 103% X 103% X 103% X 103% X 103%............for thirty years. Just start with a salary of $25,000 and do the math for thirty years and you will see where we are headed. (And where we have come from!)
Anyway, after several days of exposure to this process, I began to suffer extreme nausea, combined diarrhea and simultaneous constipation, dizziness when I made a sudden movement, blurred vision, irregular heart beat, alternate shallow and deep breathing, inability to sleep, and shingles, gout and acne broke out. My system could not stand seeing that much tax money being spent (and in some instances wasted), and being that close to so many "crats".
And sadly, there is more of this painful exposure to come. The school system is just starting their annual justification for more….and the county budget is a drop in the bucket compared to their pile of tax dollars. Then all of the cities start feeding their bureaucracies after that. By the end of this entire process I may be hospitalized.
My body systems are allergic to these types of processes. I worked in industry for over thirty years as an "efficiency expert", and helped companies become more productive, cost effective, competitive, and profitable. The bureaucratic mentality, and the manner in which they justify expenditures and control money contradicts all of my years of industrial experience. My mind reacts violently and creates all of these physical maladies.
I ask that you pray for me in the coming weeks.
RUDAMENTS: ODDS AND ENDS WORTH MENTIONING-
• The hospital vote is underway. Please study the issue and then vote. I struggled before I finally decided how I was going to vote.
• Folks, although I poke fun at the budgeting process, the commissioners do try to do a diligent job of administering the funds. The problem is, for years the mentality has been to each year increase, grow, and spend more. It is difficult to stop and change a process once it is the normal way of doing business. Reform is needed.
• I am going to get more data together about the City of Marianna and its use of water bill revenue to fund public projects. A city commissioner confronted me on my stance on the issue, so I am gathering more ammunition and keeping my powder dry, getting ready for another shot.
It is a good time to talk to your representatives about spending and growth. They are all dealing with budgets at the moment, and your comments might positively influence their vote. At the least it would let them know you are watching their behavior. Get involved and you will be "GETTING IT RIGHT".