Tuesday, March 31, 2009

So Ya Want the Gubmint To Run Things?

Is there anyone out there who is disposed towards letting the government take care of business? If so, then this is what you can expect from bureaucrats.

It happened this morning.

We have a retired trooper working in our office, a BCI Senior Investigator who now works as a part time investigator for us. He tracks down deadbeat dads so the Court can force them to pay child support. If this work isn't done, the families of these deadbeats end up on public assistance and we have to support them. He's been finding deadbeats for over eight years now and has brought in well over a million dollars in child support to the County. He does this for 20 grand a year provided by a NYS grant that reimburses the County for his services. The annual return on investment for his salary is about 1100%.

Until now.

His contact expired because New York State refused to renew the funding. After months of inquiries and red tape, the County finally stopped the program and with that, the deadbeat dad enforcement came to an end. This was the most successful child support enforcement program in Upstate New York and ... kaput. No one could figure out how such a successful program that more then paid for itself could be allowed to die on the vine.

At any rate, the Office planned a final retirement party for the investigator. He cleaned out his desk this morning and we had quite a spread for him in the law library. There was lots of comfort food and we all got a chance to say goodbye.

I went back to my office and shortly thereafter I heard one of the other investigators use the PA to announce that his contract was approved and that we were stuck with him for another year.
I thought they were just busting his balls; they do that often. They weren't.

This morning a person at the Department of Social Services called the state (I won't say what department) and asked what they should do with some open cases now that we no longer had an investigator to manage them. The state bureaucrat asked what happened and when told that the funding had dried up, responded that it is a mistake, the funds were approved and have been available. Our DSS clerk got off the phone with the state and called our office immediately.

One hand has no idea what the other is doing. Months of misinformation because no one at the state level cared enough to let someone else know what was going on, too lazy to make a phone call or fire off an email.

So who wants bureaucrats to handle your health care, the banking industry, the automobile industry, or anything else? You should handle your own affairs because you the only one that really gives a damn about the end results. Some idiot in Albany or New York City or DC is not going to go out of their way to help you.

Not all bureaucrats are useless; but I still remember about seven years ago trying to get the IRS to tell me what happened to my $1,000 tax over payment check that I never received. I spent three days, between two and two and a half hours each day, being put on hold for thirty-forty minutes at a time, getting hung up on, having rude idiots cut me off in mid sentence with senseless suggestions, dealing with touch tone menus that went no where before I finally got a young woman who eventually did help me. After that I never, ever let the IRS owe me a dime.

Jackasses sitting behind a desk will ultimately be the ruination of this country in concert with the politicians who created these jobs.

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