Letter to the Editor: A Million Here, or There

“A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking about real money,” a quote often attributed to Senator Everett Dirksen, R-Ill.  Ironically, Dirksen claimed to never have actually said it, but let it become part of folklore nonetheless.

With our nation’s debt climbing about a million dollars a minute, and with fraud eating its lion’s share, the term will soon be “trillions”. As a baby-boomer, I can recall when no cashier could bust a “Benjamin,” and the new generation hears “trillions” as everyday fodder. But as a contributing taxpayer for the last six decades, I recoil at the breaking news of fraud, theft, and inefficiency. And I am searching for answers and causes.

The Proverbs of Solomon, of course, lists the grass roots of such conditions- greed, lust, lying, laziness, basically called Sin; a term never used in politics today and rarely in church sermons. Bernie Madoff, Somali Learning Centers, Dixon, IL, LA, DC, Ukraine, and, most recently, Ohio, are all temporary headlines that serve us well for a news flash or two, and then we so quickly return to our collective slumber.

Our Founders proposed the Doctrine of Popular Sovereignty and a federalist system to be enacted by Federal, State, and local governments. It was to be the Rule of Law and Accountability. All elected officials would represent the people’s will and protect property rights, and the government’s public trust would be accountable to every citizen. Needless to say, it was a groundbreaking doctrine in its time, and, sadly, it is rare today, especially at the local level of representation.

First, the obvious- basic accounting oversight of cash flow is just that- basic math. An accountant doesn’t miss nine cents, much less $9 million! Only a door left wide open and eyes wide shut could create such a deficit. Fundamental financial controls make sure this could never happen- payment/invoice/inventory reconciliation/ account monitoring, right there in the old John Murray “Accounting Made Easy” manual.

And I must come clean here. My generation has known deep down for decades that something was wrong. First, we were electing officials in all three levels of government who never signed the front of a paycheck. Simply put, they knew (or know) nothing of efficiency or balancing a budget, much less of trimming the fat. Tasks were, and continue to be, over- budgeted with inflated developments and poorly completed projects. (My hometown recently employed a roofer for the Civic Center, which has yet to be completed and the price has escalated by 300 percent)  Somewhere between these extremes of the $9 billion missing in Minnesota and the $50,000 roofing fiasco in Henry, well, we have a problem.

In a recent Star Tribune interview, then-acting U.S. Attorney General Joe Thompson cast the net extensively in terms of responsibility, or rather, lack of it. In summary, he noted that elected officials turn a blind eye, agencies fail to act, law enforcement doesn’t push hard enough, reporters ignore the story, community leaders stay silent, and an unconcerned public sleeps on.

In my heart, I don’t want to think that it’s fraud or theft, but folks, this is the bottom line- the devastating effect is the same! Why? Because serving in the government and running a business differ in this way- it’s NOT OPM, Other People’s Money! Our elected officials have been entrusted with the duty to honor their oath to every single constituent. Ah, yes, the proverbial oath, where one raises his/her hand and swears to align their actions with their job descriptions and responsibilities. Citizens are not stockholders; we are constituents, and our Founders fully intended that our elected representatives be held responsible for public property, public funds, and the public trust.

Some cases are a result of too much trust, perhaps. The official or municipal employee seemed “too nice” to ever do such a thing.  But in the other cases, the fraud was deliberate and calculated. A liar is one who loves to make and formulate a lie for the purpose of lying. When an individual has been entrusted with fiduciary responsibilities, as with both of my current professions, fraud and inefficiency are the vilest transgressions of that trust. They were elected on the promises that they would guard and protect against those very things.

Finally, cases of sheer inefficiency result from a lack of research, a lack of knowledge, or simply a lack of effort.  Shame on those if that is the reason the public’s trust was lost. My dad would say there are only two reasons a problem continues: either you don’t know enough to solve it, or you don’t care enough to solve it. In my hometown, the intersection of Elm and Atlantic resembled a third-world country for the first thirty years I lived here. A few years ago, $20,000 was spent on repairs at the intersection, albeit poorly.  Now it’s being allowed to be destroyed again. In fact, the first vehicle to traverse the site was an eighty-thousand-pound tractor-trailer, in blatant violation of local ordinances! This abuse continues with potholes forming like pubescence acne, and tanks of chemicals have restarted their trek in violation of HAZMAT and EPA regulations, uncontested.

So what do these two extremes have in common: the state of Minnesota with over five million residents and a rural town in western Tennessee? The answer- one dollar unaccounted for at a time; one blind eye at a time; one unaware citizen at a time. Somewhere in Henry, there are unreturnable, unneeded, and unused boxes of trail cameras and the like, gathering dust, a result of the previous mayor’s reckless and unchecked spending spree. I witnessed blocks of money being reassigned for his use at his discretion, with little or no oversight. The minimal result is waste and inefficiency, and the sober realization that, from the local levels to the Federal level, officials are treating it as Other People’s Money. 

Did I mention elections are coming up soon?

Sincerely,
Tony N. Boyd
Henry, TN