Let's stipulate that Virginia governors, Democrats and Republicans, pick legislators for high-paying state jobs — always have; always will. They do so for many reasons: payback, sympathy, gamesmanship and, on occasion, because a lawmaker is qualified.
Bob McDonnell keeps alive this tradition. Sometimes, he hires a delegate or senator. Sometimes, a board he controls does it. Either way, the legislator gets a big raise.
This comes amid economic uncertainty that augurs more layoffs of classified employees — career types whose salaries have been virtually frozen — and, McDonnell says, strengthens the case for retooling pensions by shifting more of the cost to workers.
Plus, McDonnell's perceived generosity with taxpayer-financed jobs and their emoluments seems inconsistent with his rhetoric: that Virginia government is too big, too expensive and too intrusive.
Were it that simple.
At least seven former GOP legislators — Bill Janis, William Wampler, Glenn Oder, Terrie Suit, Fred Quayle, Matt Lohr and Sam Nixon — are now executive branch employees, and all, save one, are paid between $100,000 and $170,000 (Quayle gets $52,000 as a part-time member of the Parole Board). That's a lot more than the $18,000 they received as part-time solons.
The General Assembly is getting in on the fun, too, picking ex-colleagues as judges. Republican Clay Athey and Democrat Bud Phillips will soon be enrobed.
To the typical state worker, these hires are symbolic; tart reminders of one of the constants of government employment: that some in Richmond are more equal than others because they have friends in the highest places.
But McDonnell hasn't been unfriendly to those lower in the ranks. At the midpoint of his four-year term, only about 1,400 classified employees have lost their jobs, according to the state's personnel agency, the Department of Human Resource Management. That's a sliver of a classified work force of 95,548.
Rabid small-government Republicans may be underwhelmed by McDonnell's efforts to slay the bureaucratic beast. His package to shrink government is modest.
Reining in government is easier said than done. DHRM says that from 1999 until 2011 — a period spanning two Democratic administrations and two Republican administrations — the classified payroll was down 1 percent. Employment of those who can be hired and fired at will, including political appointees, dropped nearly 18.5 percent. College faculty exploded, up almost 45 percent.
Given the $200 million he wants to throw at higher education, that's the kind of big government even McDonnell can support.
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