Our government is being sold. Our public programs are being doled out to corporate interests whose goals are not necessarily in sync with the needs of the people of Texas. It is very difficult to understand the issues and implications of privatizing public services. As a state employee, I have seen positive as well as negative results from the commingling of corporate goals and public needs. The State of Texas is shifting from government-run public resources to privately controlled services. This movement, however beneficial it may seem in the short term, will have overwhelming negative implications over time.
In the early 1990’s, the Texas executive administration began making inroads to privatize public services. At this time there seems to have been conflicting legislation between the state and the federal government. The Texas Integrated Enrollment System (TIES) was being created with the purpose of rolling multiple state functions such as Assistance for Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), Food Stamps, and Medicaid into one program that would be implemented and managed by private enterprises. During this time the federal government contested that these programs must be serviced by state employees.[i] The years since have brought continual encroachment of private enterprise into the public domain. Like dominoes, social services have come under the assumed authority of private organizations. For instance, social programs in the Lower Rio Grande Valley were primarily managed in 2002 by a for-profit firm called Affiliated Computer Services, Inc.[ii] who, incidentally, spent over $500,000 in corporate and individual money courting mostly Republican politicians over the last 3 years.[iii] For years companies such as Electronic Data Systems (EDS) and Lockheed-Martin Information Management Services (IMS) have been vying for and taking over public services; from Food Stamps to toll-roads, employment to public safety. These and many other corporate firms have seen the seemingly limitless earning potential that comes along with administering public programs and services and are establishing market domination in record time.
There are positive outcomes with a privately administered public program. For example, the red tape that is normally associated with government programs is removed so that efficient work is done with minimal oversight and bureaucracy. This creates a faster and leaner service. Ideally, the reduction in cost would either be returned to the tax payer or used for the benefit of the public clients. In the short term, privatized services have many benefits, mostly economic and service oriented.
I believe that privatizing social services and other state functions has little if any truly positive aspects to the average citizen or the state as a whole. President Theodore Roosevelt wrote in The Strenuous Life, “No man is justified in doing evil on the ground of expediency.” These words ring true when discussing privatized social programs. As mentioned earlier, in the short term it appears that privatization has positive results. This is merely a mask, a false perception. In the end the results will be determined by the path. When the profits of the corporations are not given back to the taxpayer and when the corporation holds the state hostage with increased contract costs we will see past the veneer. We will see the problems, but will it be too late.
Money, power and influence are at the root of most private companies that vie for government contracts to administer public enterprise. The sense of their yearning is felt in their incessant courting of politicians. It is apparent in their creation of industry to fill a void of their own creation. Corporate power and civic politics collide at the issue of public-private administration.
To illustrate this phenomenon, let’s look at the political career of Dan Shelly[iv]. Mr. Shelly began as a state legislator from east Texas. He served from 1987 until his ouster in 1994. In 1995, newly elected Governor Bush hired Shelly as a legislative director. His primary duty during his time with the governor’s office was to manipulate legislation relating to privatized social services. After this ball was tossed into the air, Shelley began work for Lockheed-Martin Information Management Services (IMS). IMS was one of the larger companies vying for control over the fledgling privatized social services industry. He later worked for Affiliated Computer Systems, Inc. (ACS), also seeking and acquiring state contracts. Mr. Shelley moved from consulting and lobbying work for ACS to working as a consultant for Cintra, the Spanish construction company that is slated to build the Trans-Texas Corridor. In 2004, he went back to the governor’s office as a liaison between Governor Perry and the legislature. In 2005, Mr. Shelley again made the transition from public to private enterprise by going back to Cintra as a lobbyist. Mr. Shelley and his handlers appear to be hell-bent on spending state money on private enterprise.
Aside from the seemingly illicit motives behind privatizing social programs, there are many reasons showing that privatization is not in the best interest of society.
In the world of economics and corporate dominance, state contracts would seem to be high reward with a relatively low risk. The corporation does not use their name publicly while administering public programs.[v] There is little credibility to be lost by the company. The company also has no-cost access to public data to work on their programs. At the same time there are reports of private companies making huge profits at the expense of the people they are supposed to be helping.[vi]
Public entities have a direct responsibility to the people. When something goes wrong it is the public employee who faces the force of the people. You can not expect a private entity to open their doors and have an audit except by court order. A citizen has the right to receive almost any document they feel from a state agency.
Openness is a right and a responsibility that is being lost every day for the chance at private sector profits. Guaranteed access is also a right that is in danger of being sold to IMS or ACS or EDS or Cintra or a hundred other private wolves seeking to feast on the meat of our body politic, seeking to feast on us. We and the government are the same; they are us and we are them. I will try my best to insure that what is in the hands of the people stays in the hands of the people, not corporate interests.
Works cited:
[i] Nightingale, Demetra and Pindus, Nancy. “Privatization of Public Social Services.” 15 October 1997. Urban Institute 24 November 2006 http://www.urban.org/publications/407023.html
[ii] United States. Dept. of Health and Human Services. Privatization in Practice: Case Studies of Contracting for TANF Case Management. March 2003. 24 November 2006 http://aspe.hhs.gov/hsp/privatization-rpt03/appendices.htm#Texas
[iii] Center for Responsive Politics. 24 November 2006 <http://www.crp.org>
[iv] “Governor Bush’s Well-Appointed Texas Officials.” Texans for Public Justice. October 2000. 27 November 2006 http://www.tpj.org/reports/appointments/boards.html
[v] Horsburgh, Susan. “Employment For Sale (Australia privatizes its employment services.” Time International. 17 August 1998
[vi] Bowie, Stan L. “Privatized management in urban public housing: a comparative analysis of social service availability, utilization, and satisfaction” National Association of Social Workers. October 2004.
