Pollina: Douglas rewarded cronies while planning to cut jobs
The Rutland Herald, July 1, 2008, by Daniel Barlow (link to article).
MONTPELIER — Gov. James Douglas’ administration on Monday defended nearly $300,000 in merit bonuses given to state officials in the months before it proposed cutting 400 jobs from the state rolls because of the downturn in the economy.
The state government awarded about $280,000 in bonuses to more than 100 state workers in the past year, including top executive officials such as Secretary of Commerce Kevin Dorn and Douglas spokesman Jason Gibbs, Progressive party candidate for governor Anthony Pollina said.
Pollina said Douglas, a Republican, should not have been giving out merit bonuses while planning to respond to the poor economy by eliminating state jobs and freezing the salaries of other workers. The state should be adding jobs, Pollina said, not cutting them.
“Some of them no doubt went to hard-working and deserving public servants,” Pollina said. “But it is reasonable to ask why those responsible for faltering economic and environmental programs deserve merit bonuses while so many workers are losing their jobs.”
Pollina singled out Gibbs, Dorn and George Crombie, the secretary of the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources, as among the officials who received unmerited bonuses last year.
According to information released by the Pollina campaign Monday, Dorn received a bonus of about $2,600 and Crombie received $1,600. Bonuses started at around $500, although many of them were in the range of several thousand dollars, maxing out at about $5,000.
News of the merit bonuses comes less than two months after the end of the state’s legislative session, during which one of the volatile topics among lawmakers and state officials was how to reduce the state budget. Vermont’s state government is now on track to cut 400 jobs from the state’s rolls, starting with about 150 positions that will be announced today. All of the job cuts are expected to come from already vacant or otherwise unfilled positions.
Linda McIntire, the deputy secretary of the Agency of Administration, said Monday the merit bonuses were first awarded in July 2007, the start of the fiscal year and before the full extent of the tough economic times was clear.
“This is not different than what we’ve done every year since Gov. Douglas took office,” she said. “It was the same under Gov. Dean.”
But starting with this new fiscal year, McIntire said, there will be no pay increases or merit bonuses for so-called exempt employees who make more than $60,000 a year, an initiative that Administration Secretary Mike Smith announced midway through this year’s legislative session, she added.
“I can’t really say if the decision would have been made or not,” McIntire said, when asked if the state would have implemented that policy earlier had the full extent of the economic problems been known earlier last year.
Jason Gibbs defended the bonuses — and his own job performance — Monday afternoon. The Pollina campaign’s assertion that he received two bonuses last year is incorrect, he said, because the 8.05 percent salary increase — just more than $5,000 — he received was because he took on the additional duties of as the new secretary of civil and military affairs.
“I’m very proud of the job that I do and I’m proud of the work that I do for the governor,” Gibbs said. “I work very hard and I always have the best interests of Vermont first.”
During his press conference Monday, Pollina sought to connect the state of Vermont’s economy to the upcoming job cuts and last year’s wave of bonuses. The Middlesex resident pointed to a recent report from the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston that states, “Vermont was one of New England’s poorest performing economies in 2007 …”
Pollina said the report shows that Vermont not only lost 800 construction jobs and 600 manufacturing jobs, but also 400 retail jobs, which he said “speaks to the cost of doing business, but also the drop in Vermonters’ income.”
He suggested the governor should consider middle-management jobs or some of the administration’s press secretaries as possible cuts instead of the workers on the ground.
“Like a hedge fund or Wall Street firm, the Douglas administration has given those at the top a bonus while those at the bottom lose their shirts,” Pollina said.
Gibbs dismissed Pollina’s recommendation as a “tired, old argument.” He said he had not seen the report from the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, but said Douglas has sought to strengthen the state’s economy, but has been held back and blocked by the Vermont Legislature, where Democrats hold strong majorities.
“A vote for Douglas is a vote for change and economic growth,” Gibbs said. “We saw in the last session what happens when an out-of-mainstream Legislature decides not to work on important issues such as property tax relief.”
Michael Casey, the interim director of the Vermont State Employees’ Association, said he was disturbed to learn that Douglas was giving out bonuses in the same year he was discussing cutting state jobs and freezing wages.
“It seems misguided that the heads of various agencies are being awarded merit bonuses while at the same time laying off their front line employees who provide public services,” he said.
Contact Daniel Barlow at Daniel.Barlow@rutlandherald.com.