News summaries
PA: Pittsburgh weighs water privatization
As officials discuss whether leasing Pittsburgh's parking assets to a
private company is the right option to save the city's pension system,
Mayor Luke Ravenstahl is considering whether to pursue a similar deal
for the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority. "We have been asked to
look at privatizing the PWSA. ... We're going to answer the question of
whether it makes sense or not," Ravenstahl said...Atlanta,
Indianapolis, San Diego, New Orleans and Milwaukee have privatized
water authorities...Much like anticipated rate hikes associated with
the mayor's parking lease plan, water rates under privatization likely
would increase for the PWSA's 250,000 customers, said Michael Kenney,
the authority's executive director. "And they would probably want to
raise rates to what the others are charging," Kenney said...There is no
deadline or immediate need for cash to make a potential sale or lease
of the water authority worthwhile, said Councilman Patrick Dowd, a PWSA
board member who opposes privatization. "Water is such an important,
precious and vital asset," Dowd said. "Water is our most valuable
asset. I don't know why we would even consider it."
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
TX: State turns up heat on IBM
The State of Texas is once again turning up the heat on IBM to fix what
it says is a long list of deficiencies with an $863 million data center
consolidation contract. IBM, however, quickly responded in a published
statement, saying it had fulfilled its obligations under the contract
and that it had worked in good faith with the state to try to resolve
the issue....At the heart of the dispute is a seven-year agreement,
signed in 2006, that contracted IBM to consolidate the state’s 31 data centers
into two facilities. The state had hoped to achieve about $178 million
in savings as a result of the project. The project was to be completed by
December 2009, but instead the state claims less than 12% of participating
agencies’ servers have been consolidated and the work has resulted in
“harm to state agencies, exposure to unnecessary risks, and failure to
achieve the objectives set and agreed to by IBM.”
Information Management
NY: NYC deputy mayor on reshaping city government
In his first major speech since taking office last month, [New York
City's Deputy Mayor] Goldsmith told business executives at a Crain's
New York breakfast that he's rushing to re-engineer as much of
government operations as practically and politically possible to
prepare for the fiscal 2012 budget year, when the city faces a $3.3
billion deficit and the loss of hundreds of millions of dollars in
federal stimulus funds. "You name an expense item and we've got a
working group attached to it," he said...Goldsmith achieved a national
reputation for innovation as mayor of Indianapolis from 1992 through
1999, including for privatizing some city services. But such wholesale
changes aren't in the cards here. "I think the opportunities for
public-private partnerships here are probably more discreet and they're
embedded in the city agencies. It's not the wholesale privatization of
an agency," he explained. One possibility: contracting out some of the
city's 80 computer data centers.
New York Post
NJ: Gov's report finds private schools saves states money
In a report released today by Gov. Chris Christie, a study commission
on non-public schools found that private and parochial schools save New
Jersey $2.7 billion annually, while providing "expanded educational
options" for children. The report also recommended that some form of
tax scholarships or tax credits be enacted in the state, which would
help parents choose to send their children to nonpublic schools...Steve
Baker, a spokesman for the New Jersey Education Association, said
"their findings are hardly surprising. "The commission is made up
largely of people who represent organizations with a financial interest
directing public tax dollars to private schools," Baker said. "The fact
remains that almost 90 percent of New Jersey students attend public
schools. At a time when the governor is drastically reducing aid to
those schools...it is unconscionable to consider using scarce public
resources to bail our private and parochial schools."
The Star-Ledger
CA: LA's plan to outsource fire depart draws heat
City and Fire Department officials face opposition from organized labor
and some City Council members over a proposal to contract out billing
and collections for the Los Angeles Fire Department's emergency medical
services. The proposed outsourcing of collections is bundled with a
popular initiative to move to electronic collection of medical data by
the Fire Department's emergency medical services unit. The proposal
would give paramedics hand-held tablet computers on which they would
input patient medical information at the scene of an emergency,
eliminating the current system of hand-printed forms that department
staff called cumbersome and prone to transcription errors....The
two-part proposal includes a $10-million, six-year contract with
Scanhealth Inc., better known as Sansio, for the computer system. Under
a separate six-year contract, the city would pay Advanced Data
Processing Inc. up to 5.5% of net collections revenue to handle billing
and collections...Council members Dennis Zine and Jan Perry said they
liked the idea of digitizing the medical records but had concerns that
outsourcing the bill collecting operations would eliminate jobs and
might not prove more cost effective than handling collections
in-house... The full City Council will consider the proposal at its
July 20 meeting.
Los Angeles Times
TN: Union says fewer than half of Nashville custodians rehired
When metro custodians fought privatization of their jobs, they were
told they'd get first crack at employment with the private contractor.
Numbers calculated by their union indicate that's not happening. Union
spokesman Mark Naccarato said the union's research shows that fewer
than half of the custodians have been offered jobs. Union numbers show
191 Metro school custodians have been hired by GCA; another 287
custodians who applied, never got a call. Meanwhile, the union counts
at least 40 workers they say GCA hired from outside the school system.
"They just called them in instead of calling us, when they promised us
that that wasn't going to be the case," said Warren, the custodian
who’s still waiting for a call back. "They should have done what they
said they were going to do in the first place; you want to hire the
most experienced people to do this kind of work," Naccarato said.
WSMV Nashville
