How "they" get away with "it"

Paul Wolfowitz got booted for securing a plum job for his girlfriend. Hurray. The system works.

Oh please. Anyone with first-hand experience knows snouts are dipped in the public trough from city hall to national capitals on a daily basis, with no more than a wink and a nod. Wolfowitz is taking a payback hit, not being caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

Put a few foxes in the hen house, tell them to leave the chicks alone and you have dinner. Put humans next to a pile of money (whether it be tax dollars, a charitable trust or whatever), tell them it’s for the common good only, and they’ll feast on it. Period.

That’s why we build in oversights, because we know it’ll happen. So why does it still happen?

Because the oversights are largely foxes watching foxes, or chickens trying to watch foxes.

In the former case, fox A sees where B is skimming the public cream, but doesn’t blow the whistle. Why not? Because B knows A is also dipping and can play that card. So, they both keep mum and happily stuff their pockets.

In the latter case, the oversight is often charged to an independent citizens’ board. So, that should work, right?

Wrong. Let’s take the case of a county agency. In the state where I reside, the board is appointed by county commissioners and the state. But, where do the nominees come from?

The executive directors of the agency hand picks and screens the nominees before they are referred to appointment, which is largely a rubber stamp process. Don’t think they’ll select people who have the expertise, motivation and time to pry into the operation of the agency. They select people who are more likely to show up for a few monthly board meetings, readily digest the pabulum filtered and spoon fed by the executive director and go out for a glass of wine afterward, happy to have the boardship on their resumes. Or, you have the occasional board member who sees a way of getting in on the action and allows the agency to get their share, as long as he gets his.

But, the board meetings are open to the public and the press. True, but they’re seldom attended by any of the above. If vocal citizens do show up, they are listened to politely and dismissed, or outright quashed.

Even if the press shows up, figures out what’s going on from the limited and skewed data disclosed, and reports it, there’s no public outcry. If it isn’t on the sports page, what do we care?

The Childrens Services Board (CSB) in the county where I work was investigated six times in two years for botched cases that resulted in child abuse, and these were just a fraction of what went on. They were reported and, save for me and a few others, no one raised an eyebrow. It took the murder of a child at the hands of his foster parents before any action was taken. By then, the level of incompetence had risen to the point where the child was placed in a home where neither parent was employed (their sole income was fees for foster care), and the husband had criminal and mental illness records, along with a live-in girlfriend. This murder could’ve been averted if anyone paid attention to the blatant red flags that had been flying for years.

Recently, I came upon an attempt by an agency to divert a million dollars in public funding from treatment of the indigent mentally ill to the benefit of a private enterprise. I contacted the board members who were about to vote on it and was brushed off. That’s actually putting it mildly. I was warned of possible repercussions if I persisted. I was reminded that I had already been branded a troublemaker because of my rabble rousing in the CSB case. The perception was that I went after people cashing checks for not doing their jobs (a real threat), not that I had put a spotlight on child abuse.

I went to the governor’s office and was told they don’t get involved in county issues. The county agency involved is a division of a state agency.

Fight fire with fire. I spent some of my political chips with a county kingmaker who happens to have some ethics (some do exist). He rattled some cages of the board members before the showdown board meeting. I called the attention of the major media to the issue, providing documentation, and urged them to attend the meeting (none showed up). The meeting was bloody, but we did manage to at least get the issue tabled for a month. My calling attention to the lack of due diligence by the executive director (if not garden variety corruption) was quashed by the board chairperson, but there were no press there to witness and report that. Public meetings are supposed to be open by law, but the chairperson does have discretion to “limit” comment.

Perhaps even more revealing in the meeting was another “minor” issue. The executive director proposed an additional employee benefit for him and his staff; paid membership at a luxury health spa (over $700/employee/year). Not a gym. Not a YMCA. A luxury spa. Does your employer pay your dues at a spa? The board approved it unanimously.

So, public money, that’s supposed to provide treatment and relief to the indigent teenage suicidals, victims of rape and abuse, etc,. is being diverted. Do you think the voters intended for their taxes to go for treatment of the poor or subsidizing a $125,000/year manager’s hot tub sessions? Do you think it’s right that many of the taxpayers, who can barely afford a YMCA membership for themselves, are forced to underwrite luxury “welfare” to a six-figure public employee? I repeat, the vote was unanimous.

You may not, but that’s probably because you’re not immersed in the world of abundant public and charitable funds. There, it’s business as usual.

I called a reporter about the spa issue. She could barely suppress the yawn, much less ask for details. Business as usual.

A board member of that agency contacted the chairman of the board of an organization I work for and warned him that he'd better rein me in. He told me. About it. We laughed.