Headlines
The war on public sector workers – Dean Baker
IL: Critics of infrastructure trust say it needs more oversight
IL: Infrastructure privatization and the loss of faith in the public sector
FL: Fla Senate women flex muscles
MI: Rochester school board votes to outsource busing, custodians
The war on public sector workers – Dean Baker
Politicians across the country are using heaping doses of the politics of envy to try to arouse the anger of workers. However, their targets are not the corporate CEOs pulling down tens of millions of dollars a year in pay and bonuses. Nor is it the Wall Street crew that got incredibly rich inflating the housing bubble and then took government handouts to stay alive through the bust. The targets of these politicians’ wrath are school teachers, firefighters and other public sector workers. They are outraged that many of these workers still earn enough to support a middle-class family. Even more outrageous, many of these workers have traditionally defined benefit pensions that assure them of a modicum of comfort in retirement. Having managed to ensure that most workers in the private sector did not benefit much from economic growth over the last three decades, the same upward redistributionist crew is turning their guns on public sector workers. Huffington Post
IL: Critics of infrastructure trust say it needs more oversight
The proposed expansion of public-private partnerships to rebuild Chicago would give a board dominated by corporate financiers handpicked by Mayor Rahm Emanuel the power to hammer out multimillion-dollar deals without many of the checks and balances meant to keep City Hall in line. Even after the mayor revised his plan to try to win over aldermen ahead of a key City Council hearing Monday, the ordinance still does not provide for oversight by the inspector general, guarantee compliance with state transparency laws or prevent board members from leaving and immediately joining companies they just helped win lucrative contracts. Emanuel is now offering to explicitly give aldermen the power to vote on projects financed by the Chicago Infrastructure Trust that involve city money, assets or land. But the measure does not extend that authority to the CTA, Chicago Public Schools and Chicago Park District. Even if those sister agencies are allowed to weigh in, their boards are all appointed by the mayor. “The whole ordinance reeks of ‘trust us, trust me — I’ll do the right thing,'” said Julie Roin, a University of Chicago Law School professor with expertise in local government. “But there aren’t any controls. Maybe he is to be trusted and the people he appoints are to be trusted, but how do we know?” Chicago Tribune
IL: Infrastructure privatization and the loss of faith in the public sector
The Sun-Times has some excellent reporting on an undersung element of late-Daley privatization: “Chicago faces $200 million claim over privatized parking garage.” How’s that again? The company that bought the city parking garages (brought to you by Morgan Stanley, the same giant behind the parking meter deal) claims the city promised no new parking garages with public parking would be built in the vicinity of their purchased garages. That didn’t happen, and now they want dough. While it might sound typical of the city’s misadventures in privatization, regularly used in the media as a cautionary tale, we can take some cold comfort in not being alone: claims to exclusivity for privatized infrastructure are a regular, and regularly controversial, aspect of public-private partnerships, as Brad Plumer writes: Moreover, a road that’s privately owned for 75 years has the potential to conflict with other public-policy goals. For instance, as a recent GAO report (pdf) found, four of the five privately-funded toll road projects in the last 15 years included non-compete clauses that prevented the government from building nearby roads. As Tim Lee notes, “real-world privatization schemes are often explicitly protectionist.” So what if a state, say, later decides that it wants to build a rail network that competes with the private road? All sorts of complications could arise. Chicago Mag
FL: Fla Senate women flex muscles
On the final day of the 2012 legislative session, Sen. Paula Dockery worked the Senate chamber, counting “no” votes on a bill to turn failing public schools into private charter schools. She and fellow senators — mostly women — had rallied against the controversial proposal for weeks. The Miami Herald
MI: Rochester school board votes to outsource busing, custodians
Choosing from what they called a “bucket of bad choices,” the Rochester Board of Education voted 7-0 Monday night to outsource transportation, custodian and partial grounds services beginning in the fall. I’s a move that will save the district almost $12 million over the next three years and it’s necessary, board members say, as the district is facing a $10.8 million shortfall next year — the largest in Oakland County, Superintendent Fred Clarke said.It w as a vote wrapped in emotion: Board members and a crowd of about 100 people listened for almost an hour as transportation employees pleaded with the board to keep their jobs…The move will, essentially, eliminate the entire transportation and custodian departments as well as three grounds positions in the district. All of the employees in those departments will receive layoff notices, except for the transportation manager, who will be kept in that role for one year to help facilitate the transition. Patch.com