FEDS LOST IN THE FOREST

Feds Lost in the Forest

You might think that a Federal administration that squandered a huge budget surplus and is now swimming in record deficits would become more cautious about spending money on dubious projects.

The Bush Administration, however, never ceases to astonish and outrage with its penchant for throwing bad money after good in the name of ideology and pork. One recent example involves its determination - despite the results of prior studies on the matter - to privatize up to 15,000 jobs in the Forest Service.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which oversees the Forest Service, previously spent $100 million - $30 million above what it had budgeted - to do a study as to whether 9,000 other Forest Service jobs could be more cheaply performed if they were farmed out to a contractor. It wound up with no clear evidence that it would in fact be cheaper to outsource those jobs.

According to the Forest Service Council President of the National Federation of Federal Employees, Bill Dougan, additional studies would probably have to be paid for by reallocating funds earmarked for resource management projects.

NFFE President Rick Brown told this newspaper's Ginger Adams Otis that as Federal employees have demonstrated repeatedly during such study projects that they perform services better and more efficiently than private contractors, the Bush Administration has made it easier for contractors to appeal the decisions that go against them. This doesn't make much sense, but neither does the administration's repeated use of Halliburton - Vice President Cheney's old firm - despite findings that it outrageously overcharged the Federal Government for its services in Iraq.

A spokeswoman for the Forest Service told this newspaper that it had conducted 171 outsourcing studies during the past four years, and 162 of the surveyed positions were kept as civil service posts.

Those figures are intended to suggest that the decisions are being made on the merits. The question they raise, though, is given how infrequently determinations are being made to farm out forest service positions, why spend such huge amounts of money on privatization studies?

It may please Mr. Bush's voting base, but given the state of the Federal treasury thanks to his fiscal policies, it strikes us as mindless self-indulgence at a time when it can't be afforded.