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End-of-Life Choices

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No Middleman

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Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Brown Wants To End Wasteful Spending on 718 State Reports

On Tuesday, Gov. Jerry Brown (D) announced a plan to eliminate the production of 718 bureaucratic reports that he believes are unnecessary. Legislative action is needed to eliminate 375 of the reports, while the Brown administration will end the other 343. The governor's office did not specify how much money would be saved through the plan, but Brown spokesperson Elizabeth Ashford said eliminating the reports would result in "significant savings in terms of employee productivity, and printing and distribution costs."

Reader Comments:
  • 1
  • 04/18/2012
  • Hrant Kouyoumdjian

I must be reliving the 1980s; this is yet another déjà vu! One of my first tasks as a coordinator for policy and program evaluation back then at the State Department of Health Care Services, I surveyed the number of no longer used "defunct bureaucratic" reports; we had a staff consensus list of some 30+ reports to eliminate with the legislature's approval. The number of vested stakeholders that crept up from the woodworks opposing even the most arcane one page useless statistical reports was unbelievable. For when there is a mandated report, there is a constituency and that means resources are allocated to staffing and funding. As the French say: plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. Get the popcorn out.



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