Government is a necessary evil

And government is too often a playground for egos and insider deals. Something happens to many of those elected to public office. No matter how astute they are in their private business, government leaders often make the dumbest decisions while in office. It’s like a mass psychological plague takes over; people who would never spend their own money on some hairbrained scheme are all too willing to spend taxpayer money.
Here are just a few examples of what I’m talking about:

• A story this week showed just how dumb Gwinnett County leaders were in spending millions of tax dollars to build a minor league baseball stadium a few years ago. Gwinnett leaders sold the plan by saying the stadium would be an economic development draw for the county. Now, the plan is falling apart. A key part of the overall development deal was to be a bunch of connected commercial development. But now the county is looking to allow a slew of apartments instead. The project is already struggling since the county hasn’t generated the revenue it promised from the deal. Of course, the Gwinnett County government and local developers have long been married at the hip in that community and the county government has been just an extension of the development community’s insider dealings. But it’s the average Gwinnett taxpayer who’s getting his pocket picked for that government’s mistakes. To think that a minor league ballpark would be an engine of development was just typical Gwinnett leaders’ ego.

• The Jackson County government recently amended a 2007 policy concerning what happens if bad weather closes the county government. If the county is closed for bad weather, county employees will get paid anyway. Under a 2004 policy, employees had to take the missed time as a paid vacation or personal day. The 2007 and now amended 2012 policy is insane. Things happen. Sometimes bad weather closes down businesses, too, but employees don’t get paid for that day. If a farmer can’t work in his field because of bad weather, he doesn’t get compensated. If a restaurant is closed because of bad weather, waitresses don’t get paid. I don’t know of any business that pays people to stay home during bad weather. But government does because it’s not their money being spent. And why have a policy like that when the Jackson County government is imposing furlough days anyway? It doesn’t make sense to get paid to stay home in bad weather.

• The state continues to shift more of the cost of education to the local governments. Starting next year, for example, local systems will have to pay a larger share of the insurance cost for bus drivers and other non-certified school personnel. It’s a shell game being played by the state to lower its costs by moving more expenses to local governments. But the local governments get that money from the local taxpayers, so in the end those paying the bill are still getting hit. In Barrow County, it will cost that school system over $3 million in local dollars in the coming years. And anyway, where in the private sector do part-time employees get insurance benefits? Very few private sector businesses offer benefits for part-time workers, but it’s common in the public sector and not just with bus drivers. Many city councils and county commissions also offer their board members fat insurance plans for what is a part-time job.

• Back in Gwinnett County, local towns are happy that their police forces can again use radar after a political dispute with the county took that away a year ago. They’re happy not for reasons of public safety — the lack of radar use didn’t cause any more wrecks in Gwinnett according to published reports — no, they’re happy because now those towns can again use radar as a way to raise money for city governments. Traffic enforcement is supposed to be for safety reasons; but in reality, most traffic enforcement by small towns is for the money. High fines for minor traffic violations are the norm and city governments often pressure their police forces to raise more and more fine income. It eventually falls apart because towns can’t generate enough fine income to offset the cost of the officers (ask the towns of Hoschton, Pendergrass and Arcade about that.) But it is disingenuous for a local city government to use its police department as a source of income while giving wink-wink lip service to “public safety.” It’s just putting men with guns on the road to stop drivers and extort money from them. It isn’t right and it degrades public trust in both law enforcement and government in general.

• The City of Jefferson recently had a day-long retreat to discuss city issues and plans for the future. Among the items discussed was the question what, if anything, should the city do about people riding golf carts on the streets in a couple of large subdivisions. Apparently, kids like to ride the golf carts to the neighborhood pool in the summer. But there are those in these neighborhoods who are having a fit about it; how dare kids ride a golf cart on the subdivision streets! So city fathers spent an hour discussing the issue. Who cares, except for a few meddling neighbors who have nothing really important to think about? Nobody’s been hurt on a golf cart that I’m aware of — and the large golf carts are safer than kids riding bikes on those same subdivision streets. What a waste of a government’s time.

Yes, I am a critic of many governments. Some individual government officials try to do the right thing, but many governments have become little more than playgrounds for the connected.

And there are too many governments — too many small towns that collect tax money and pay a staff, but return little in the way of needed services to their citizens. Even mostly good governments waste a lot of tax money with inefficiency, duplicated services and inane projects driven by the ego of elected officials who wants their name on the door of a building.

Government is a necessary evil in our society. Somebody has to pave roads and provide law enforcement. Somebody has to provide education and other services. If everyone did what they should do in life, we wouldn’t need much government.

But too many people have elevated government to the status of “the great problem solver” and turn to it to fix all of life’s issues. It cannot, and should not, try to do that.

We need government, but we also need to remember it is not the solution to all our problems.

Mike Buffington is co-publisher of Mainstreet Newspapers. He can be reached at mike@mainstreetnews.com.