Tag Archives: Wanda Minoli

Phil Scott’s Back-to-the-Office Order Is Going to Cost Something, Whether He Wants to Admit It or Not

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There are questions circulating in legislative circles about the potential cost of Gov. Phil Scott’s return-to-office mandate, which takes effect on December 1 and requires at least three days a week of office work for state employees. Questions, but few answers.

Well, my headline gives away the real answer: It will definitely cost some amount of money at a time when the state faces a severe financial pinch due to Trump administration fuckery with federal spending, including a government shutdown that Congressional Republicans are in no hurry to resolve.

The governor couldn’t have foreseen the shutdown when he issued his order in late August. But the current situation would seem to call for reconsideration. Because we don’t know how much it will cost to accommodate state employees returning to office work, but we do know one thing for certain: It’s gonna cost something. And we really can’t afford it right now.

Last week, Agency of Human Services staffers rallied in Waterbury to protest the potential impacts of the back-to-office order. They pointed out that the Agency doesn’t have enough space to accommodate its entire workforce. They pinned the shortfall at 250 desks; later, the administration gave an actual figure of 254. Administration Secretary Sarah Clark suggested it wasn’t so bad because staffers working part-time on-site could share desks! Wow, that’d boost morale. And productivity.

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The Incredible Disappearing Corrections Commissioner

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Well, this is a new twist on the old “Friday Newsdump,” the storied tradition of minimizing the impact of bad news by pushing it out on a Friday afternoon or early evening. I guess we can call this a “Monday morning newsdump.”

I’m referring to the sudden announcement, with absolutely no explanation given, that Nicholas Deml is resigning as commissioner of the Vermont Department of Corrections, effective less than three weeks from now.

The announcement came in the form of a press release from Gov. Phil Scott’s office, which included the naming of Deml’s replacement: Fformer Burlington police chief Jon Murad will step into the roleon August 15, the day Deml officially departs. No reason for Deml’s resignation was offered.

And apparently, there was little effort to find out by the Grey Gardens of our Fourth Estate. The stories posted by VTDigger and Seven Days essentially barfed up Scott’s press release with no indication of much additional effort. Not even a line saying “Deml was not immediately available for comment.” Vermont Public‘s story did include one line from am emailed statement in which Deml wrote of launching “an advisory practice to continue the work I care about most.” That’s the only hint I could find, anywhere, of a reason for leaving or plans for the future.

Other media outlets, including the comatose Burlington Free Press and WCAX and WFFF/WVNY, led their stories with Murad’s appointment. Deml’s resignation didn’t even warrant headline placement.

That’s awfully thin coverage for a significant departure, likely thanks to the weekly rhythms of the newsroom. Monday is for gearing up to full operations after a weekend of little to no activity. You’re trying to get some news out there ASAP, and often starting from scratch. Which means that Monday morning isn’t quite as good a time to bury news as Friday afternoon, but it’s not a bad second choice. The administration got the kind of minimal, incurious coverage it probably hoped for.

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The Land of Generic Expertise

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The appointment of Don Rendall as interim chair of the state Natural Resources Board reminded me of something I’ve been pondering for quite some time: Our state government relies heavily on generic expertise. People are often hired to state positions outside of their professional experience. People within the executive branch are frequently swapped around as if they are interchangeable pieces. And people from the same small pool get hired over and over again to different positions. Rarely is someone with specific outside expertise hired for a relevant public sector post. Rendall has been a gas and utility executive, but he has no particular experience in environmental or land-use matters.

This is a long-running theme in state government, but it seems more prevalent in the Scott administration. Every time a top-level vacancy opens up, it’s filled laterally from elsewhere in the executive branch (Mike Schirling, from Commerce to Public Safety) or vertically from within an agency’s ranks (Lindsay Kurrle replacing Schirling, Wanda Minoli replacing Robert Ide) — or the hire goes to someone like Rendall, who brings no specific expertise to the job.

These kinds of hires do have advantages. If you’ve got experience in one part of state government, you have a base of knowledge that’s useful elsewhere. (Susanne Young has been an effective administrator in multiple roles under Jim Douglas and Phil Scott.) If you’ve been successful outside state government, you have skills that can be brought to bear in the public sector. Neale Lunderville has had success in both spheres, and has been called upon more than once for crisis management.

But there are also drawbacks. Hiring from within an agency, or swapping people around within state government, can foster stagnation, satisfaction with the status quo, a lack of vision for positive change. Two examples: The DMV under Ide and Minoli, which has had repeated issues with undocumented immigrants (and has been slow to adapt modern technology); and the Department of Corrections, whose upper ranks are full of DOC lifers — and where interim commissioner James Baker has been struggling to “change the culture.”

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The Cromulent Bureaucrat

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The official responsible for the Scott administration’s biggest clusterf*ck to date has been … rewarded with a promotion?

You can tell the Gov had no qualms about removing the “interim” tag from Labor Commissioner Michael Harrington’s business cards because he [checks notes] announced the news at 4:56 p.m. last Friday.

Yeah, the classic weekend newsdump.

Harrington, voted the administration official most likely to be featured in the Lands’ End fall catalogue in an imaginary poll, was named interim DOL chief last September in a Falling of the Cabinet Dominos — old-school hardass Tom Anderson stepped down as public safety chief, Commerce Secretary Michael Schirling replaced him, then-labor commissioner Lindsay Kurrle slid into Schirling’s seat, and then-deputy labor commish Harrington moved up the ladder.

His interimship has featured the failure of a long-overdue upgrade of unemployment insurance software, and the UI system’s collapse under the unprecedented demands of the Covid-19 pandemic. Neither can be fully blamed on Harrington; in many ways he was dealt a really bad hand at the worst possible time.

But still. When a team performs poorly, the coach gets the zig. You might say Harrington is the Hue Jackson of Team Scott. It wasn’t entirely Jackson’s fault that the Cleveland Browns had a 3-36-1 record — the front office was a disaster, and Jimmy Haslam may be the worst owner in the NFL. But the coach bore the brunt.

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