When Lt. Gov. Fedele decided to survey Connecticut’s population for advice and feedback and reassurance on how to handle the budget mess, he didn’t turn to just anyone. No, he was looking for input from the best and the brightest, the most wise and perceptive. Cohen the Columnist received the survey. Who did you think was going to get it? Pagani?
So, first, he wanted to know if I approved of the general budget proposal drift, as presented by Gov. M. Jodi Rell: no tax increases, no state employee layoffs, but “serious” budget cuts, and union “concessions.”
Well, I’m a little worried about “serious” budget cuts, without any layoffs. How do you do that? It sounds like you’re going to keep all the guys on the payroll to plow the roads — but not buy them any plows. No layoffs?
United Technologies, the state’s largest private employer, is dumping two or three trillion folks. Disney World is even dumping Mickey Mouse at the amusement parks. Can’t we even lay off the three guys at the Department of Transportation in charge of timing the traffic lights on the Berlin Turnpike? Who would miss them?
‘Equitable’ Taxes?
The lieutenant governor knew that I’d be cranky. He followed with possible alternatives to the governor’s proposal that I might like to see. Increasing taxes “equitably” on all taxpayers? Well, as long as it was “equitable.” Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. That Fedele is a crafty one. He knew I wouldn’t like that. Perhaps, he asked, you might prefer layoffs of state employees and additional union concessions?
Well, sure, that goes without saying. The problem is, I’d really like to see something that doesn’t show up on the survey: The Rell administration transformed into privatizing fools. Maybe you wouldn’t have to cut any programs at all, if you simply opened the Yellow Pages and found private contractors to bid on virtually every state government program and service. State employees would be free to bid on the jobs, and in the face of competition, they wouldn’t need much help finding “union concessions.”
The survey goes on to ask whether there are any particular state programs that might deserve a little whacking, ranging from public safety to corrections to veterans services to social services. See? That’s what I mean.
Privatization Spin-Offs
Like a number of states, Connecticut could spin off its veterans facilities to private contractors, unless there is some very special “Connecticut’ way of providing nursing home care to the old guys. Corrections? States that aren’t beholden to public-sector labor unions have increasingly brought in private contractors to build and manage prisons — or send the prisoners out-of-state.
In a bit of survey-construction-run-amok, Lt. Gov. Fedele also wanted to know what I would say to him and the governor if we were in an elevator together. Well, I would probably beg for an appointment to the Permanent Commission on the Status of Women because I’m very worried about women and their status and stuff.
And finally, the survey allowed me to swing for the fences, to “share,” to comment on any other issue that’s important to me. OK. Let me buy wine in grocery stores; finish the construction of mysterious Route 11, even if it means killing off endangered bunnies and filling in wetlands with nuclear waste; and, oh, by the way, do away with the Permanent Commission on the Status of Women, to which you just appointed me.
That, my friends, is how you fill out a survey, provide guidance to a state in need, and celebrate with a bottle of champagne that you bought at the grocery store.
Laurence D. Cohen is a freelance writer.
