Recent Senate Staffing Issues

NOTE: This entry was written before the younger Pedro Espada officially resigned his position with the State Senate Office of Intergovernmental Relations. Technical issues prevented me from posting before now. The younger Espada's decision to resign is the right one. However, his being hired wasn't the only concern, it was just the headline-grabber. The concerns I have go a lot deeper than that. I've decided therefore to post anyway.

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For those of you who don't know, various post-coup Senate hires and pre- and post-coup Senate pay raises are raising the ire of the press. (No links...I'm feeling off-the-cuff today.) The hire most emblematic of the issue is said to be that of Senator Pedro Espada's son (also named Pedro Espada) by the Senate's Intergovernmental Relations office, a hire which at least one Democratic Senator seems uncomfortable with, to say the least. (I'm pretty sure it's the same Senator, “leaking” his or her opinions anonymously to several news organizations, intending to create the impression that it's just one.)

Underlying a lot of these criticisms in part is a kind of prejudice against legislative staff. Years ago, I read a poll...People, it seems, thought Congress had too much staff. Of course, they had no idea how much staff Congress had, just that it was "too much." Too many people think, wrongly, that legislative staff are a net loss for the State, that they are unnecessary, that they are all patronage, that none of them are qualified for what they are supposed to do, that there are too many of them, that they are a drain. The reality is that a carefully-chosen, hard-working legislative staff is absolutely necessary if you want a legislature to properly function and enact good public policy. The world is a complex place, and legislating responsibly requires research, analysis, number-crunching, legal advice, knowledge of political strategies, and a bunch of other things. Without staff, the Senators' only source of information and assistance would be lobbyists, and the Internet (for those of them who know how to use it). (And I'm not getting into administrative staff...People who open the envelopes you send your elected officials, or who read the E-Mails you send to your elected officials.)

So I don't begrudge the Senate Democratic conference for hiring staff. In fact, I think they probably need to do some more hiring....Just the right kind.

The Democrats are going about their hiring in a questionable manner, both on the substance and on the perception. The perception problems are obvious. A lot of these people are being hired at six figures, in the middle of a fiscal crisis, to perform jobs that seem to lack clear descriptions. The hiring of Senator Espada's son is an extreme example. It smacks of both nepotism and featherbedding. Nepotism is defined by Merriam-Webster as “favoritism (as in appointment to a job) based on kinship.” Some nepotism is inevitable in legislatures, because the politicians tend to want to hire people they feel they can trust, and who can you trust more than your own family or the family of a colleague and political ally. Featherbedding is defined by Merriam-Webster as “the requiring of an employer usually under a union rule or safety statute to hire more employees than are needed or to limit production.” In the private sector, featherbedding in a union contract is illegal. Some of it, however, is inevitable, because there are going to be disputes about how many people it takes to perform a given job.

The hiring of Senator Espada's son, however, appears to be both of these in the extreme. He may well be qualified for a position in intergovernmental relations, but there's no reason to believe that his legitimate qualifications were what got him the job, Which, I must point out again, is newly created and is six-figures, for a guy in his 30s. Right now we don't even know what the job is, let alone what other qualifications the younger Pedro Espada has.

And on the substance....They are hiring the wrong people, for the wrong positions, and paying too much money to too many people. What they NEED are mid-level researchers, analysts, and number-crunchers. Guys who know how to research issues and write position papers, guys who can write down bullet points that press people can turn into press releases, and that lawyers can turn into legislation.

Based on what we know now, from the press (always accurate, right?) the staff structure that's emerging at the Democratic Party-controlled State Senate is very top-heavy, with a lot of people authorized to give orders and seemingly not as many authorized to follow them. The staff structure is mirroring the leadership structure. I can't quite tell who's going to be doing the substantive “heavy lifting.” A $150,000 a year general counsel might be necessary, but not everyone can have the six-figure job. There has to be enough left over to hire the $65,000 or $75,000 analysts who are capable of cutting through the lobbyists' noise and discerning the truth, which can then be presented to Senators in a coherent format so that decisions can be made. $120,000 a year inter-governmental relations people do you little good when what you need is a $65,000 policy wonk to write a compelling, effective grant request to submit to a federal agency, or a long letter to a local government to explain in detail how the Senate will help it accomplish its policy goals despite the fact that state aid cuts are only going to get worse, not better.

The one high-level hire they have made lately that they definitely needed was Ahmed Diomande as their “interim” Senate Finance Secretary. That office needed a “chief” but hasn't had one until now. Want to bet he's making less money than Senator Espada's son? And why is he “interim?” The Senate Finance Committee needs a qualified person (which he appears on the surface to be) to run it permanently and full-time.

I'm not saying the other hires weren't necessary. I am however saying that it doesn't look good.

I would say the Democrats are headed toward disaster unless they change course. However, the Republicans are behaving so disgracefully and incompetently that they are almost helping the Democrats more than themselves. As far as I can tell, their staff is similarly top-heavy, and seems to consist mostly of attack dogs. They are taking an approach kinda like that taken by Assemblymen Tedisco when he was the Assembly Minority Leader. And we all know how successful he was at adding seats! (That is to say, he was not successful.)

Thus, the Democrats need not fear too much, at least at the ballot box, despite their seemingly-bad staff decisions. Based on what I know, the voters could reasonably conclude that the alternative is worse.

Average New Yorkers, however, do have a lot to fear. The Democrats' obsession with a top-heavy staff structure isn't going to help them make policy when what's needed is middle-level types.

I hope I'm wrong, and that there's plenty of quiet, competent, qualified people employed by the Senate Majority, and that they just don't get press attention. (The press focusing on the negative? Heaven forbid!!!)

And if I'm not wrong, I hope they find some of those staffers soon. Not everyone can be the six-figure, high-powered guy yelling into the Blackberry. Someone has to mind the store as well.

Oh, and New York: When they get around to hiring those people (if they do), don't whine about their salaries....Stick to whining about the top guys, if you must.