Taming Bureaucracy

The concepts of reining in rogue bureaucrats, cutting the cost of government, eliminating “red tape,” responding to scandals and punishing bureaucratic miscreants, eliminating redundancies and waste, spurning growth without undue regulatory hurdles and generally increasing governmental efficiency have been at the forefront of every election in recent memory. Yet, when Congress passes and the president signs a federal statute to “do something,” it is always a bureaucracy that is charged with “doing it.”

With partisanship threatening every federal job every time there is a new political reconfiguration, a system of “due process” and legal checks and balances – generally our Civil Service system – was designed to create a sense of stability and security for federal employees (remembering that some federal employees are appointed and not subject to civil service rights). There is an inherent tension between those civil service protections and Congressional aspirations to rein in that political beast.

There probably isn’t a politician in the mix who believes our federal bureaucracy is an exemplary model of governmental perfection. But the solutions are not so easy in the quagmire we call government. The Secret Service and the Veteran’s Administration are the most recent bad boyz of government, with failures and scandals representing a fundamental inability of those bureaucracies to fulfill their most basic federal mandate.

There’s been an effort on both sides of the aisle to get a handle on bureaucratic failures, scandals and waste. “President Obama’s repeated proposals for a Commission of Federal Public Service Reform have been ignored by Congress. He first made that call in 2011, then in each budget request since, although the White House has put no energy behind it.” Washington Post, February 24^th. The GOP has preferred a more hands-on, meat-axe approach, with overall budget cuts (e.g., the “sequester”) and new proposed rules that would eviscerate a pile of civil service protections. Lots of voters appreciate that path. Others say it would render government impossible to implement.

Aside from budgeting cutting, what is the general notion of the new GOP-dominated Congress when it comes to pulling back civil service rules that protect bureaucrats under a notion of due process? While there hasn’t been a set of new legislative proposals that apply across the board, we certainly can look at proposed GOP statutes that are specifically directed at the failed Veteran’s Administration for guidance on their overall philosophy of holding bureaucrats more responsible to Congress.

“Rep. Jeff Miller (R-Fla.) doesn’t need a commission or another report. He chairs a congressional committee. He is using that powerful perch to remake the civil service at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) one step at a time. It is an effort that has implications, some better than others, for the federal workforce generally… Miller said he hopes his colleagues use his legislation ‘as a template to look into other agencies within the federal government.’…

“Last year, the House gave overwhelming bipartisan support to his legislation that would have stripped VA Senior Executive Service (SES) members of their due process rights to appeal disciplinary actions. The department’s secretary would have had the power to fire at will the high-ranking civil servants. This could have led to the creation of a political spoils system, with civil servants falling at the whim of whatever party was in control… That measure was modified before it became law, handing VA senior executives a truncated appeals system that still makes them due-process paupers.” Washington Post, February 24^th.

So what do Miller’s statutory proposals suggest for the entire system, assuming the GOP could pass the legislation and get it passed the president? “Miller has proposed a series of VA bills that could provide a road map for a broader civil service reform effort. The measures include:

“● H.R. 280, which authorizes the VA secretary to recoup bonuses and awards paid to those Miller’s news release calls ‘failed employees.’ The secretary would issue regulations related to the repayments, and the employees could have a hearing before the secretary.

“● H.R. 473, which would allow the VA secretary to reduce pensions of SES employees convicted of crimes that influenced work performance. It also would limit SES paid administrative leave to 14 days unless extended by the secretary and would require SES members to rotate positions within the department every five years. Top performance ratings and bonuses would be limited to 30 percent of VA senior executives.

“● H.R. 571, known as the Veterans Affairs Retaliation Prevention Act of 2015, would create a system for reporting claims of retaliation against VA whistleblowers and would establish mandatory minimum penalties for employees who engage in retaliation.

“‘I know there is an appetite in Congress to fix the VA and to hold people accountable and not reward bad behavior,’ Miller said. ‘That’s what these bills are designed to do.’… One common factor in these bills is the sense that accountability means punishment for the bad, instead of resources for the good — a point not lost on federal employee leaders… Said Carol Bonosaro, president of the Senior Executives Association, ‘The continuing stream of punitive legislation directed at the VA SES . . . will deter the recruitment and retention of well-qualified, dedicated executives.’” The Post. Is there a middle ground? Can there be a middle ground? Will there be a middle ground?  What are your thoughts?

I’m Peter Dekom, and while bureaucracy needs to be challenged, we also have to make sure that the medicine doesn’t kill the patient.