President Dougan Takes on Anti-Federal Worker Congressman in National Newspaper
Thursday, July 14, 2011(National Federation of Federal Employees)
NFFE National President William R. Dougan wrote a letter to the editor of prominent national newspaper Roll Call debunking a recent op-ed by Republican Congressman Dennis Ross of Florida. In his article, Ross called for a ten percent reduction in the federal workforce – a move that would amount to 200,000 jobs lost by 2015. Here is what President Dougan had to say in response:
The June 30 Guest
Observer by Rep. Dennis
Ross (R-Fla.) to justify cutting
more than 200,000 federal jobs during one of
our nation’s biggest economic slumps begs for a
more deliberate analysis.
His
assertion that a 10 percent reduction in the
federal workforce will result in a “smarter and
leaner” public workforce is simply
wrong.
Any
proposals designed to reduce the number of
federal workers without a corresponding
reduction in federal agency mandates will only
increase the number of contract employees that
agencies will be forced to use to pick up the
workload. While not technically federal
employees, taxpayers pay for contract employee
salaries the same as civilian federal workers,
yet contractors cost taxpayers more in most
cases.
If Ross
is serious about truly reducing the size of
government, he and others in Congress should
lead a genuine conversation with the American
people about what specific programs should be
reshaped or scaled back. While this effort may
be more difficult politically, it is the only
genuine way to reduce the size of the
government.
After
all, you can’t measure the size of government
by the number of employees — you measure in
dollars and cents.
— William R. Dougan, national president of the National Federation of Federal Employees
Click Here to Read President Dougan's Letter to the Editor