One of the arguments that “Big G” Government types like to make for growing the size and scope of public services is that “the Government is never going to go out of business–so it will always be there for you.” And while it is true that it usually takes decades of liberal governance to put municipal governments into dire financial straits, it doesn’t take much for government services to grind to a halt if no one wants to do the work.
Just a few short years after we hailed “essential workers” for continuing to show up in person during the early days of the pandemic to keep municipal services running, the numbers of those who consider the services they provided to be that “essential” are falling fast. That is being borne out in a number of stories we’ve had for you the last couple of months here on WHBY.
One example is Valley Transit cutting its service hours on weeknights and on Saturdays. While ridership continues to fall far short of what’s needed for the system to break even, state and federal grants keep it in operation. But the transit system can’t find enough people willing to drive buses–especially at night and on weekends. They have tried hiring bonuses and higher pay rates, but those have hardly moved the needle. And so those who actually relied on Valley Transit for transportation during the times that were just eliminated are put in a tough spot. The solution? Contract with a private-sector company to provide on-demand rides in smaller, privately-owned vehicles, rather than buses.
VT isn’t alone in this bind. Greater Oshkosh Transit is looking to trim Saturday service due to driver shortages, and Green Bay Metro has combined routes and turned to private “micro-transit” options to deal with not enough people to drive their buses. Both school districts that own their own bus fleets, and the private companies that contract with the other districts, can’t hire enough people to drive kids to school every day–so office personnel and mechanics are often pressed into service.
And when those kids get to public schools, they find fewer people willing to teach them. That is especially true for kids with special needs, or those hoping to take classes in specialized fields. I will say, there seems to be no shortage of people wanting to take on administrative positions outside of the classroom–as that classification continues to grow faster than in-class instructors. But, apparently that is only to a point. Members of the Oshkosh Area School Board defended a high starting salary and sizeable built-in raises for Superintendent Bryan Davis by pointing out there is a shrinking pool of “qualified candidates” for that position for a district of their size.
There are countless proposals for public-sector daycare centers as well. But the shortage of available childcare is less about a lack of physical places to warehouse kids during the day, and again, more about not enough people wanting to do that job. So where are these government operations going to find any more workers?
Earlier this month, the Neenah-Menasha Fire Rescue had to lower its qualification standards in hopes of drawing more applicants for firefighter positions. This week, the Oshkosh Fire Department was given the go-ahead to end ambulance service for outlying townships due to an inability to find eight qualified candidates to staff a fourth ambulance unit for the department. That means those townships will have to contract with a private company to provide that service–that is if they can find one with enough staffing.
Winnebago County’s owned and operated nursing home, the Parkview Health Center, has dozens of rooms sitting empty, while low-income seniors sit on a waiting list, because it cannot keep enough nurses and staff. Just like Valley Transit, they have offered sizeable hiring bonuses and increased starting wages, but that has not produced nearly enough new hires to safely provide services to additional residents.
Municipal pools across the area have had to trim operating hours or institute “everyone out of the pool” times during the day due to not having enough lifeguards to keep an eye on swimmers and still get required breaks. Recreation programs have been cut back due to not enough “parkies” (as we used to call them) to lead kids in activities. Public youth sports and high school athletics are hampered by a lack of officials to work games and personnel to handle duties like scoreboards, game clocks, and scorebooks. Coaching at levels below varsity in many public schools is understaffed as well–often falling to district employees that are not particularly qualified to coach. And as an official, I can tell you that working both games of a girls/boys doubleheader for basketball is becoming far more common.
I bring all of this up after learning of the platform that Socialist candidate Zohran Mamdani ran on in winning the Democratic primary for Mayor of New York City this week. (Quick aside, why do so many Socialists run as Democrats when they have their own party?) In addition to “freezing rents”, Mamdani wants to make New York City buses free for everyone and to open “government owned” grocery stores in so-called “food deserts”.
Multiple media sources cite reports that New York’s transit system is already short as many as 400-drivers–which has forced it to drop some “express” routes and has produced horrible “on-time performance” results. How would increasing demand by eliminating any cost to ride the bus create an improved user experience or reliability? Or convince more people to work for the transit system?
A quick stop at any grocery store anywhere in the US will confront you with half-empty shelves, a handful of staffed checkout lanes, and carts strewn throughout the parking lot because retailers are struggling mightily to maintain staffing levels. The same goes for distributors of food who are increasingly failing to meet orders coming from stores. So how does Mamdani plan to properly staff and stock a city-run grocery chain if companies that have been in the business for over 100-years can’t maintain consistent product and services?
Personally, I don’t blame those fleeing the public sector one bit for trying to find greener pastures. Human behavior since the advent of the internet and especially since the pandemic has deteriorated considerably. And those in municipal services usually have to deal with the worst of it. Do you want to drive a bus and constantly have to have eyes on the rearview mirror to make sure someone zonked out on drugs or suffering a mental episode isn’t about to beat you on the head? Would you want to deal with kids who have zero social skills, that have never been disciplined at home, and that have serious behavioral issues–that in the past would have placed them in specialized educational settings–but are now required to be mainstreamed with all other kids?
The solution to some of these municipal staffing levels may lie in technology. If Oshkosh Corporation can build a truck that can drive itself through a war zone, someone should be able to design a self-driving bus that can navigate New York City streets. The same systems could be used for garbage trucks and snowplows some day as well. Such changes would likely be opposed by municipal employee unions–of course, if no one is part of the union, how much strength would they actually have?
Conservatives are often criticized for “knee-capping” Government by refusing to “fund it properly”, but right now, the American people are doing a much better job just by not wanting to do the job.
