Cut administration, fraud and waste, not services

By Rafael Garcia-Rangel

Tough economic times are an opportunity to take a look around and see how much money is being wasted and how things could be made more efficient. This applies to our home as well as our State. Our economy grew and so did our bureaucracy. Now that our economy has shrunk, our bureaucracy, and not our services, must follow suit.

Spending cuts must be designated and not "across the board." A ten percent pay cut for a state employee earning $40,000 per year will have more of an impact on their family's quality of life than that of one making $140,000 per year. When our public officials propose cuts in department spending they do not specify where the cuts will be made. They leave the decision making to the executives of the various bureaucracies affected, washing their hands clean from the devastation their decision will have on communities and families. The result is layoffs and furloughs for the employees who serve the public directly, a higher workload for those that remain, and less services of lower quality for the public at large.

Many of our citizens and state employees, including executives, have lost their sense of civic responsibility and as a result will stop at nothing to enrich themselves with taxpayer money. We must therefore invest in fraud prevention and detection in all of our public agencies.