Douglas and the tub

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( – promoted by odum)

Sorry for this overworked quote but here it fits.“My goal is to cut government in half in twenty-five years, to get it down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub.” (Grover Norquist).

Governor Jim Douglas has now targeted positions for elimination which cost the state no money. Its part of a “merger and consolidation” plan of some kind.The Public Safety Commissioner claims the latest elimination of nuclear safety personnel will not harm public safety but provides no prove other than his assurance of  trust me. With Entergy’s aging Vermont Yankee plant sitting in the Southern part of state leaking and rusting this seems the height of foolishness.

No explanation is offered about how a no-cost-to-the-state job’s elimination will save the state money. The positions are funded by the owners of Vermont Yankee. Once again a zig, a zag, an artful smoke and mirrors flourish followed by the elimination of some state jobs and a favor to Entergy in the mix. Douglas is in the tub.

Gov. James Douglas says the layoffs are needed to save $17 million in General Fund expenses. However, the radiological-preparedness position held by Jaclyn Harman – one of two state workers identified for potential elimination at the Department of Public Safety’s 21-person Vermont Emergency Management division – is paid for entirely from a special reserve funded by the owners of the nuclear plant.

Public Safety Commissioner Thomas Tremblay confirmed that no General Fund dollars are used for Harman’s job. However, he said the elimination of Harman’s position would be part of a larger “merger and consolidation” plan that might save General Fund money

http://www.timesargus.com/arti…

5 thoughts on “Douglas and the tub”

  1. Here’s what VDP Chairwoman Judy Bevans had to say in a press release on

    Tuesday (emphases mine):

    Zicconi’s Promotion = Douglas Economics: Protect & Promote Pals, Put Workers on Unemployment

    With the news of Governor Jim Douglas’s promotion and a huge pay raise for former administration spokesman for the Agency of Transportation John Zicconi, Vermont Democratic Chairwoman Judy Bevans called the Governor on his double-standard.

    “In case after case,” Bevans said, “the governor insists that job cuts for frontline workers are necessary to balance the budget. Yet when we look into too many of those cuts, they eliminate federally funded positions at no savings, endanger the safety and health of Vermonters, or cost the state money. This Zicconi promotion is simply the latest and most blatant installment of the Governor’s real plan to protect and promote his pals and appointees.”

    Bevans was referring to a report by Louis Porter of the Vermont Press Bureau highlighting Zicconi’s promotion from AoT’s “spokesman” to the agency’s Director of Planning, Outreach and Community Affairs. The new position gets him a raise of $14,000 over his previous position, after that job’s compensation was cut 5 percent. Bevans noted that the pay raise equals half a year’s wages for some of the workers whose jobs are targeted for elimination by the Governor.

    “That the Governor makes this move on the same day his administration announces its intent to put 320 front-line state employees on unemployment indicates his total lack of respect for the jobs Vermont state workers do and the Vermonters they serve. It’s a blatant double standard from a governor whose own appointees are responsible for almost half the growth in state government since 2003.”

    Bevans concluded, “This is the epitome of Douglas’s morally and ethically bankrupt economics: Demand more work for less from long-time state employees, and protect and promote his high-paid pals. Douglas demands cuts in pay and hours or even positions from the people who inspect our food, plow our roads, fix our bridges, deliver mental health services, ensure our environmental safety, and tout our Green Mountain State outside our borders. At the same time, he makes his high-salary appointees ‘exempt’ from any budget accountability. It’s clear that Jim equals job cuts and chaos in state government.”

    NanuqFC

    In a Time of Universal Deceit, TELLING the TRUTH Is a Revolutionary Act. – George Orwell

  2. …was that the idea of cutting administration spokespeople was odious to the administration because it wouldn’t serve their goal of cutting payroll expenses.  I.e., it would reduce budget costs but it wouldn’t reduce the part of the budget that Douglas wants to reduce.  From the Rutland Herald:

    Administration officials, meanwhile, took issue with the reduction of contract expenses and elimination of communications jobs. Secretary of Administration Neale Lunderville said reducing contract expenses will not save labor costs, and therefore isn’t germane to the negotiations. The administration will look to reduce those costs, he said, but not as part of a plan to cut government-wide payroll costs.

    I’ve joked before that I missed the old style Republican party when it was just about screwing the poor.  In retrospect, I don’t think I’ve missed them at all.

  3. This guy is a smarmy little bastard who has never had to work in the real world. Douglas has handed him a career, through his campiagns and now as an underling to King James. It’s no wonder that he’s pissed about all these low-rung workers taking taxpayer money away from his ability to further pad his bank account and the accounts of all Jim’s ass kissers. Personally, I welcome the day Vermont says no more Jim and all these poseurs have to find work in the Vermont that the all the people he’s firing have to find work in now. Lunderville’s an opportunist, pure and simple. Once the Vermont gravy train leaves town, he’ll be off to whore for some new Sugar Daddy. Some day little boy. Some day.  

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