Last year, Gov. Sam Brownback launched an early retirement program to entice state employees into quitting. About 1,000 took advantage of the offer to provide health insurance and a one-time cash bonus. Kansas, the administration proudly announced, would save $34.5 million over two years as a result.
Wow!
The not-so-wow side of this coin is that most of those employees were doing useful work and are now being missed. The results of their early retirements are beginning to show up. A report to the House Appropriations Committee shows that those left on the job in state hospitals are now working long hours and making up for their low pay by putting in scads of time-and-a-half overtime.
According to the investigation made for the Legislature, Larned State Hospital, which houses the state’s sexual predator treatment program, is now so understaffed that it could lose accreditation from the centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services, which could cost the state $14.5 million in federal funds, according to the Associated Press.
Osawatomie State Hospital and Rainbow Mental Health Facility lost a total of 20 employees to the early retirement program, but were allowed to fill only two of the vacated positions. Parsons State Hospital lost 18 positions and has kept another 31 positions open because of budget cuts, while overtime at the hospital has risen 114 percent over last year.
THE REMEDY is painfully clear: It just isn’t true that government can be stripped down without affecting the services government provides. It is true that those services are needed by the people, which is why conscientious governors and legislatures of the past put them in place.
Step one is to change the attitude at the state house. Step two is to hire replacements for those who accepted the governor’s bribe. Tomorrow would be a good time to start.
— Emerson Lynn, jr.
