NewsOK
BY STATE REP. DAVID DANK
Published: July 6, 2011
Imagine a business with multiple locations, like a retail chain. Because of bad management, every store has its own president, board of directors, accounting department and purchasing agent. Swollen overhead would drive the cost of a simple loaf of bread to $5 or more — a massive waste that would soon put that mythical firm out of business.
Unfortunately, that's precisely the model that drives much of state and local government in Oklahoma. We are burdened with enormous amounts of duplication, excessive overhead and waste, with many government functions so poorly structured they resemble a voracious beast demanding endless appropriations. Here are some examples:
We have 62 CareerTech campuses and 52 separate public college campuses. In some cases, two- and four-year colleges sit just a few miles apart, each offering essentially identical degree programs, and each with its own layers of administration. Ironically, many college courses are now offered online, which means students don't even need to drive to the campus.
We still have 526 public school districts. Almost 400 of those have fewer than 1,000 students, and again, many lie just down the street from each other. In at least one case we're paying more than $134,000 a year to a superintendent who oversees some 115 students... FULL ARTICLE
Posted on
Wed, July 6, 2011
by John Cox