Cities Outsource Government to Private Companies

[Iplayboard]

[i]Newly formed cities are giving the keys to city hall to private companies that say they can run a government better than bureaucrats.

Mayors in "contract cities" say they get better services for less money; more flexibility, because private employees can be hired and fired more easily than workers under civil service rules; and lower debt, because they can own fewer buildings and less equipment.

"We wanted to get the most efficient possible use of our tax dollars," Mayor Eva Galambos says.

"As a privately held company, employee-owned, it behooves everyone in the company to help somebody else."

Fred Siegel, author of the book The Prince of the City— about how Mayor Rudy Giuliani battled public-employee union influence in New York — says the privatizing trend is driven by voters who think local governments have stopped being accountable to them.


[i]

Full Article

[hmkpoker]

For once, I have absolutely no idea how to feel about this.


Just remember, the police are sneaky and may subcontract your corporate hits to the NRA.

[ianlippert]

[ QUOTE ]
For once, I have absolutely no idea how to feel about this.


[/ QUOTE ]

I dont see why. It seems like these companies are just taking over the administrative part of government, although the article really didnt go into detail. As for the 'shadow government' scare, just write up a contract which makes the private company as open as it was when run by a public company.

[BluffTHIS!]

This trend should be welcomed and ebraced by all cities & counties and states as far as grunt work is what is being talked about. Administators or functions dealing with confidential citizen information would be different. There is just no reason that government employees should be the ones filling potholes or collecting garbage or working on subways. Contract that all out. Of course what isn't kosher though is no-bid contracts. Government and the citizenry have no obligation whatsoever to provide tenured pampered jobs for current or future manual labor type of jobs. And some clerical types of jobs would fall into that category as well.

[irvman21]

Sounds like an end run around the unions that choke productivity everywhere they exist. Anything that moves work away from unions is fine by me.