Furloughs: A Tragedy for Two Reasons

I can only tell you what is printed below is a truthful account of a discussion with a second-level manager at a major state agency. Of course, for reasons you will understand, I'm not going to tell you who it was, or which agency. And I just talked to the one. I didn't call others. But here's the story.

These furloughs. Yes, a day off without pay. Supposed to save the state money. Conveniently scheduled on a Friday, a three-day unpaid long weekend. But how do they see them on the front line?

First, the state first sends out a block of paperwork to each agency to be filled out. The state does not merely tell the agency managers to “manage” the days off. In other words, it doesn't let the managers pick the days so the closure of the agency will least impact its “customers.”  For instance, wouldn't you want to close the Capitol sometime in the dark raining winter, like after Thanksgiving, when there are few, if any visitors? No, they do it in the middle of the summer.

And second, the agency staff is being told not to answer their phones, email, or otherwise communicate with the outside world. No contact – they're supposed to act like they’re gone for good. Ironically they are not told to do this over weekends, or on personal vacations when the more conscientious among them checks in with their offices.

I may be missing the mark here, but it looks like, almost intentionally, the state is trying to cause pain. It seems like the plan is to make the furlough days a message of just how valuable all these unsolicited services are to our citizenry.

I hope the story is an exception, and that the person with whom I had been talking simply misunderstood the order from above.