Government jobs

Preserving marginal government jobs isn't a good use of taxpayer money.

Responding to news that the Morton County Farm Service Agency office in Elkhart was among the offices scheduled for closing, Vienna Lee, head of the Morton County Economic Development office, said, “This will have a large economic impact on our community. We’re really up in arms about it, and we plan to say so.”

Such a reaction is understandable from an official in a county whose population and economic vitality are in decline, but it’s also the kind of thinking that is making government jobs one of the fastest growing sectors of job growth in the state.

According to the Kansas Department of Labor, government jobs in the state grew by 2 percent from December 2005 to December 2006. Government jobs recorded the largest increase of any service-producing job category and was well ahead of the overall 0.8 percent nonfarm job growth for all state industries during the same period. There were about 5,300 more government jobs in Kansas in December 2006 than in December 2005.

It’s unfortunate that cities such as Elkhart are having economic problems, but holding on to marginal taxpayer-funded jobs is not a desirable economic development strategy.

The closing of the Morton County FSA office is part of a plan that will close 11 FSA offices statewide and consolidate their operations with offices in neighboring counties. Morton County farmers are scheduled to be served by the Stevens County FSA office in Hugoton about 35 miles to the south of Elkhart. Residents of Morton County likely drive much further than that on a regular basis for groceries, health care and other essential services.

With modern communication tools such as telephones, fax machines and computer technology, it is much easier to obtain information and conduct business without physically going to an FSA office. The number of farmers who need to deal with the FSA office also has declined as farms have consolidated and grown.

It’s understandable that Morton County officials are concerned. Even though closing the FSA office there will save only about $24,000 a year, they are concerned about anything that might reduce the number of people who come to Elkhart. But, for many of the same reasons that schools across the state have consolidated, it simply doesn’t make economic sense to maintain certain government offices to serve a diminishing population.

In recent years Gov. Kathleen Sebelius has discussed the need to move more state jobs away from Topeka and other larger cities to some of the struggling rural areas of the state. Moving essential state jobs to smaller communities makes sense, but creating or artificially preserving government jobs – at the local, state or federal level – just to provide local jobs is a poor use of taxpayer money.

The FSA office-closing plan was developed by officials based in Kansas and is a realistic strategy to cut costs while preserving important services for state farmers. It’s unfortunate that it is a painful plan for some locations, but hanging on to government jobs primarily to prop up local economies is an unfair burden to taxpayers.