The Department of Veterans Affairs came under fire last week over another localized scandal, this time in Illinois. A veterans hospital near Chicago, already beset by a myriad of other problems, is accused of leaving the bodies of several dead veterans to rot for up to two months.
Such stories remind us that a lack of accountability among government employees has severe consequences. It should also remind us that it doesn’t have to be this way. Laws can be changed and agencies can be reformed, if the public demands it and there is the political will.
This is one area where Donald Trump, in the spirit of running for president as a businessman, has put forward some proposals that are steps in the right direction.
Liberals mock Trump saying he wants to improve government by simply firing everyone. The jibe refers to his TV career, in which his best known words were, “You’re fired.”
But actually, if you look at the Veterans Administration and many other sclerotic and cynical government agencies, telling a few employees throughout the hierarchy that they’re fired might prove salutary.
It behooves anyone given a public trust to explore new and better ways of executing the task they have undertaken. If public employees were to work with the same requirement as employees in the private sector do, that they actually do the jobs for which they are paid, or else lose them, the public would probably get better value for its money.
As matters stand, federal employees caught stealing from taxpayers, or who engage in gross misuse of government credit cards or who even are charged with armed robbery are allowed to keep their jobs. That’s saying nothing of those who simply malinger or are incompetent. This has created a culture in which such outrages as the infamous GSA conference in Las Vegas become possible, and are dreamed up approvingly by government managers.
The Department of Veterans Affairs is the poster child for this problem. Despite agonizing scandals over callous treatment of veterans, the bureaucracy has ferociously resisted proposals to impose real accountability, fire managers for systemic failure and jettison staff for habitual and uncorrected misbehavior.
But the VA is by no means the only agency being run as a jobs program for people indifferent to the needs of those they are supposed to be serving. Those bureaucrats who try earnestly to serve the public, especially those who dare to report wrongdoing, are grievously harmed by a culture that is infected by less diligent employees.
Legislation in Congress that would allow the sacking of malefactors should be implemented government-wide as part of a broader civil service reform. Bureaucratic indifference and malfeasance put an indelible stain on the federal government. There should be consequences for employees whose hard drives suddenly and implausibly malfunction the moment Congress issues a document request, or who find flimsy excuses to let veterans’ applications for benefits gather dust.
There absolutely must be severe consequences for supervisory employees who retaliate against whistleblowers, a problem that the veterans scandal has demonstrated to be nearly ubiquitous. Retaliation should be a firing offense by rule.
During the Republican National Convention, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie addressed a separate but related issue when he discussed ending the practice of allowing political appointees to be “burrowed” into the civil service. This practice has been used by both parties over the years, and even the federal employees’ union is not fond of it. It embeds clusters of government managers with political agendas, and at worst creates illegal obstacles to future presidents’ agendas and future laws passed by Congress.
The phrase “good enough for government work” doesn’t always have to mean what it does today. A proper reform of the civil service is long overdue, and it’s a topic that both presidential candidates should discuss.
