[Speed Gibson,
Saturday May 5, 2007 at 5:03pm]
Gerri's Law
Early in my career, a more experienced peer gave me some insight that I named after her. Gerri's Law says no matter how much overtime you put in at the beginning of a project, you will work just as many overtime hours at the end of the project.
This seems to apply to the Legislature, too. All those extra hours in March and April seem to be bearing no fruit. The Legislature is pretty much on the traditional calendar, with the most of the work undone in early May, with about two weeks left.
Extra hours by themselves mean nothing. If you're asked to calculate how much paint it will take to repaint a water tower, you can spend a lot of time (and money) getting actual measurements rather than just review the as-built plans. You can spend more time using 3.14159265 for pi instead of just 3.14, and it doesn't change anything.
The DFL has wasted countless hours handing out gavels and making bills wind through more committees. But the biggest waste of time has been in not taking the Governor at his word, as evidenced by the veto of the bonding bill.
Forget Minnesota for the moment; take any state. Is it not unreasonable to expect a veto if that legislature passes a $300 million bill instead of the $75 million that governor had requested? Now add the fact that Governor Pawlenty has promised as much since the election. All that time was predictably lost. The starting point is again the Governor's proposal, not this mess of a bill that grew in the House, grew in the Senate, and grew still more in the conference committee.
It looks like this will be the fate of several other bills.
This seems to apply to the Legislature, too. All those extra hours in March and April seem to be bearing no fruit. The Legislature is pretty much on the traditional calendar, with the most of the work undone in early May, with about two weeks left.
Extra hours by themselves mean nothing. If you're asked to calculate how much paint it will take to repaint a water tower, you can spend a lot of time (and money) getting actual measurements rather than just review the as-built plans. You can spend more time using 3.14159265 for pi instead of just 3.14, and it doesn't change anything.
The DFL has wasted countless hours handing out gavels and making bills wind through more committees. But the biggest waste of time has been in not taking the Governor at his word, as evidenced by the veto of the bonding bill.
Forget Minnesota for the moment; take any state. Is it not unreasonable to expect a veto if that legislature passes a $300 million bill instead of the $75 million that governor had requested? Now add the fact that Governor Pawlenty has promised as much since the election. All that time was predictably lost. The starting point is again the Governor's proposal, not this mess of a bill that grew in the House, grew in the Senate, and grew still more in the conference committee.
It looks like this will be the fate of several other bills.