Panel - State government must grow to get smaller

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- It sounds similar to the philosophy that it takes money to make money: State government must grow to find ways to cut costs.

That's the ironic conclusion of a legislative panel charged with looking at ways to make government more efficient, especially by considering the use of more private companies to handle government duties.

The Joint Committee on Legislative Research's subcommittee on competition and privatization met last week to approve its report recommending a course of action to the legislature.

It called for creating a five-person Missouri Competition and Review Board, with an annual budget of $500,000, to determine which government duties could be done better and cheaper by the private sector. The members would be nominated by the governor and confirmed by the Senate.

The panel, led by Sen. Gary Nodler, R-Joplin, acknowledged that increasing the size of government to save taxpayer money may sound a bit odd, but said it's a necessary move.

"No analysis of efficiency-enhancing operations can be performed without some direct or indirect expense," the committee said.

But not everyone -- especially Democratic lawmakers on the panel -- was convinced that a new board is the way to go.

"We're going to set up a bureaucracy to streamline bureaucracy," said Sen. Joan Bray, D-St. Louis.

$100,000 worth of waste

Rick Althaus, who teaches political science at Southeast Missouri State University, chuckled when told of the plan, and said he expected much of the board's work would involve looking at what has succeeded in other states.

"I don't know that that requires a new agency," he said.

He also said that creating new offices and jobs gets expensive, considering salaries, benefits, office space and equipment.

"To make one person pay for him or herself, that person's going to have to find at least $100,000 worth of waste every year," he said. "I just think that's tough to do."

In a nod to the group's emphasis on using the private sector more, Nodler said in an interview that a new government-run operation isn't the only possible answer.

"We should be mindful of the possibility of employing private contractors to do that work as well as the possibility of setting up a government bureaucracy to do that work," he said.

The idea comes just weeks before Republican governor-elect Matt Blunt takes office. Blunt has said he plans to establish a committee early in his administration to look for ways to restructure government and save money.

The legislative committee said it's aware a new government organization could raise concerns and recommended watching that its funds are well-spent. It said the proposed board should be evaluated to ensure it finds more savings in state government than it costs to operate.

"If it works properly, it ends up as a net plus for the state budget," Nodler said.

Avoid becoming the problem

The panel's report said such a new board "must avoid becoming part of the problem it seeks to resolve.

"Any such entity created by legislative action will -- at least in perception if not in fact -- become a part of the very bureaucratic inefficiency it hopes to reduce," the report said.

The legislative committee said a new organization would bring independence. The report said asking agencies to explain how some of their duties could be better handled by an outside company might not result in a complete picture of the situation.

"The tendency of agencies to assume a defensive posture could color their view of the feasibility of change," the report said.

The report also said that relying on current legislative committees could allow the process to get bogged down in politics.

While it could take hundreds of thousands of dollars to run the proposed board, Missouri taxpayers would have to wait a while to learn how much money the expanded bureaucracy is making, or at least saving, them.