PR Outsourcing Nightmare

The Department of Children and Families awarded JPMorgan Chase & Co. the contract to manage the Electronic Benefit Transfer. The EBT is responsible for food stamps. Florida food stamp recipients having problems were directed to a call center in India. Because we all know there is nothing unemployed people enjoy more than speaking to someone that has outsourced their job. Thankfully, no politician civil would make political hay out of this. Unfortunately, Ronda Storms was never known for her tact.

"We should not have any jobs going outside of the country. We have enough people here in our country, we need to take care of our own who need to work," said Storms.

Storms is like clockwork. She never fails to use an issue for political opportunism.

Florida Economics Update

More news that will drive anti-outsourcing progressives batshit.

A recent study by the Economic Policy Institute found that Florida lost 100,900 jobs from 2000 to 2007. It is not just manufacturing jobs. The technology sector is feeling the pinch.

Increased imports of computers and electronics account for nearly half of the $178 billion trade deficit between 2001 and 2007.

More than a quarter of last year's $68 billion trade deficit came from advanced technology products. In comparison, the U.S. has a $15 billion trade surplus with the rest of the world in advanced technology products.

More than half of the jobs displaced by trade to China were in the top half of the country's wage earners.

A Center of American Progress study shows Florida having 0 percent growth in manufacturing jobs. Although, I do question where the study finds a 1.3 percent growth in non-manufacturing jobs. (Perhaps from population growth.) I wrote a recent post about increased unemployment in Florida.

My views on outsourcing are more tempered. One of these days, I will finally get around to writing a post on outsourcing.

In other news: the Florida budget is going to take more cuts. The state deficit is increasing. Governor Charlie Crist's solution is to tap into the state coffers.

Recognizing that possibility, legislators earlier this year gave Crist authority to use half of the $700 million in the state's budget-stabilization fund to patch holes in the 2008-09 spending plan.

Once that money is depleted, Crist could then tap as much as $1 billion from the Lawton Chiles Endowment Fund, usually used to finance health-care programs, to bring the budget back into balance.

Florida's economic woes are being felt at the county level. Alachua County has a $14 billion deficit. There is no daylight in the near future. Crist and the legislature lack the political courage to clean up the tax loopholes. Crist and the legislature have forced counties to increase property taxes and then tell voters they will relieve their property taxes. The Florida tax system is a shell game. The latest is the Amendment 5 proposal that would cut property taxes. Sales taxes would make up the difference. Crist lacks the courage to firmly say if he supports the amendment.

"I'm evaluating it," he said. "I think the closer we get to November the better idea we'll have about our level of involvement."

True leadership at it's finest.

Outsourcing Madness

Strange, but true. The Miami Herald is outsourcing advertising and production design work for the (drum rolls please) community news section. What better way to get a sense of the community than from New Delhi.

Florida House Attempts to Outsource Tolls

A perfect example of the pickle the Florida Legislature have gotten themselves into with year-after-year tax cuts is their latest hair-brained scheme. HB 7033 proposes that paying private companies to run toll booths would actually raise revenue for transportation expenses.

Public-private transportation facilities.--The Legislature hereby finds and declares that there is a public need for rapid construction of safe and efficient transportation facilities for the purpose of travel within the state. It is the intent of the Legislature to strengthen the state's transportation system by providing the department with innovative financing techniques, including, but not limited to, public-private partnerships, toll facility leases, and user fees. In response to increased congestion, population, and market demands, and that it is in the public's interest to provide for the construction of additional safe, convenient, and economical transportation facilities.

More.

(a) With the exception of the Florida Turnpike System, the department may leas existing toll facilities through public-private partnerships. If the agreement for leasing an existing toll facility does not include provisions for additional capacity, the project and the provisions of the agreement must be approved by the Legislature. The public-private partnership agreement must ensure that the toll facility is properly operated, maintained, and renewed in accordance with department
99 standards.

(b) The department may develop new toll facilities or increase capacity on existing toll facilities through public-private partnerships. The public-private partnership agreement must ensure that the toll facility is properly operated, maintained, and renewed in accordance with department standards.

(c) The amount of toll or fare revenues shall be regulated by the department pursuant to s. 338.165(3). The regulations governing the future increase of toll or fare revenues shall be included in the public-private partnership agreement.

(d) The department shall include provisions in the public-private partnership agreement that ensure a portion of excess revenues from tolled projects are returned to the department over the life of the public-private partnership agreement. In 113 the case of a lease of an existing toll facility, the department shall receive a portion of funds upon closing on the agreements and shall also include provisions in the agreement to receive payment of a portion of excess revenues over the life of the public-private partnership.

Paying private companies to run toll booths and receiving only a "pontion" of the revenue does not sound like a money-making deal. The Sunshine Skyway Bridge would have been affected by this bill. The Herald Tribune reports that the bill appears to be dead this year. What is interesting is the bill would add more expenses to the Florida Department of Transportation.

A House bill (HB 7033) that would let existing toll facilities, like the Skyway Bridge, be leased to private companies. The companies would pay the state an upfront fee and then recoup their investment by raising tolls on the facilities over the term of a 50-year, or longer, lease. The legislation would also provide more incentives to private companies to build new toll facilities.

A bill that would lift the cap on bonds issued by the Florida Turnpike System from $4.5 billion to $9 billion. It would add another $900 million in turnpike projects to the DOT's five-year construction program.

This bill is pork that is meant to provide a financial windfall for private companies. I wrote before that outsourcing hasn't saved Florida money. That was never the point of HB 7033. It was just the sales pitch.

Jeb Ruled By Fear

Ruth Sykes was briefly Jeb Bush's efficiency expert. She quit when it became apparent that Bush would not heed her warnings about privatization.

Bush made Sykes his $95,000-a-year director of efficiency and enterprise development about two weeks after the Department of Management Services put out a "request for information" on privatizing personnel services. And get this: Sykes thought People First was headed for trouble!

The 20-year Air Force veteran, who retired in Niceville, also had this odd notion about trusting the troops.

"As I told the governor, people have the answers, your employees have the answers," she told me at the time. "They know where the waste is; they know where the problems are. They will help you if you let them, if they have the motivation to help."

What state employees had under Bush was fear. "You feel like you can't voice your opinion and be critical," Sykes said back then. "I felt like I was exposing things - 'This is a different way, consider this' - and this is what I was brought here to do."

Bush's inspector general Bill Monroe has been unable to prove outsourcing saved the taxpayers money.

Florida Outsourcing

Charlie Crist has appointed Alex Sink, Jim Zingale and Holly Benson to review Florida's outsourcing contracts.

Crist appointed Sink and three other state officials to the new "council on efficient government," which was created by the 2006 Legislature. The council's first task will be a review of three large and troubled "outsourcing" projects left by Gov. Jeb Bush — the "People First" privatization of personnel services with Convergys, the MyFloridaMarketplace purchasing contract with Accenture and the Project Aspire contract that was until recently handled by BearingPoint.

"The review will serve as a starting point for evaluating how to reap the most value from the system, whether privatization has merit — if it does, we should use it, if it doesn't, we should not," Crist said at a news conference with Sink.

Jeb Bush's own inspector general Bill Monroe has been unable to prove that outsourcing has saved the taxpayers money.

The outsourcing has also been filled with corruption. Accenture made the felon list that had to be scrapped because of incompetence. It is easy to see why they got the contract.

Before the 2002 election, Accenture gave $25,000 to Florida Republicans and none to Democrats, according to a Florida Division of Election records.

The review of the outsourcing is a good start. I applaud Crist and Sink for doing it.