No more need to ‘press 1’ here
THOSE calling the state Workers’ Compensation Commission may encounter something that isn’t always expected with modern government bureaucracies: a person, not a machine, at the other end of the line. Commissioner Mark Liotta announced this week that the agency will no longer use an automated answering service to handle calls during normal working hours.
Commission officials said the automated system was less efficient than having calls answered by someone on staff. The commission’s director of legal operations said using live operators has ensured that callers “have been directed more appropriately with fewer steps,” which has “significantly improved response to public inquiries, with less caller frustration.”
The switch to live operators has not increased operational costs, said Liotta, who noted he understands why people prefer a live operator. “I just find it extremely frustrating to call my government and be met with a recording and computerized options to direct my call, and eventually being put on hold, sent to a voice mailbox, or my call being dropped,” he said.
A receptionist at the commission said people are not only surprised to hear a person respond to their call, but are “sometimes so startled they have to take a minute to remember why they called.”
In general, automation improves efficiency and reduces expenses. But there are times when a human touch provides benefit as well, and those who have reason to contact the commission will no doubt welcome this change.
It’s no wonder
Those who doubt the need for school choice programs that allow parents to use state money to choose the school their child attends should note the recent comments of a former East Central High School teacher in Tulsa. Mike McGuire, who served 20 years as the school’s U.S. Army Junior ROTC instructor, told the Tulsa World he left the job after being reprimanded for his response to student concerns about two classmates who returned to school after 10 days in jail on human trafficking complaints. “I told my students, especially the girls, ‘If you’re concerned, you need to tell your parents so they can express their concern to their school board representative,’” McGuire said. “If my daughters were going to school in a place with pimps running around it, I would want to know.” Is it any wonder some parents want more choices when it comes to educating their children?
No excuses
Shaquem Griffin has been proving doubters wrong all his life. Why not at the NFL Combine, too? Griffin, a linebacker from the University of Central Florida, has no left hand. That didn’t keep him from making 74 tackles (13.5 for loss) and seven sacks last season, or 92 tackles (20 for loss) and 11.5 sacks the year before. At the combine, Griffin, using a prosthesis, wowed observers by bench pressing 225 pounds 20 times. The 40-yard dash was the next day. “People say, can you run fast? Your brother’s fast, are you fast?” said Griffin, whose brother Shaquill plays cornerback for the Seattle Seahawks. “I’m gonna show you tomorrow and see if I can check that box off, too. I’m going to check every box off of the things people say I can’t do.” Griffin did exactly that with a 4.38-second time in the 40 — the best by a linebacker since 2003. “There are always going to be more questions,” he said. “Anything that I can do, I gotta hold myself to a higher standard, because it’s just that important to everybody.” Griffin will be easy to root for on draft day.
Age and guile
Online scams — think of the “Nigerian prince” genre — have been around for years now. Stereotype holds that older people are the most likely to fall for these grifts. But the Federal Trade Commission’s annual databook of consumer complaints shows otherwise. USA Today reports that 18 percent of U.S. consumers age 70 or older who reported losing money to fraud were bilked by such scams last year. In comparison, 40 percent of Americans in their 20s who reported fraud in 2017 indicated they lost money to online scams. The average amount lost was far larger for the older generation than the younger, which partly is the result of older folks having more financial assets to lose in the first place. But the numbers undermine the narrative of gullible old people who are confused by modern technology. It seems age and guile still count for something.
Political downfall
Nashville Mayor Megan Barry, recently considered a rising Democratic star in Tennessee politics, pleaded guilty this week to felony theft of property over $10,000 related to an affair with her former police bodyguard, and then resigned. Barry and Sgt. Rob Forrest were accused of engaging in the affair while Forrest was on the state clock, and there’s little reason to doubt that was the case. The two attended 10 cityfunded trips by themselves without any other mayor’s office staff present, including to conferences overseas in Paris and Greece and two to Washington. The Tennessean newspaper reports that Forrest earned $173,843 in overtime from July 2015 through Jan. 15 of this year, “more than the amount earned by the four other police officers in Barry’s detail combined.” Barry and Forrest not only violated spousal trust (both are married), but the trust of taxpayers.
Texas turnout
In the lead-up to this week’s statewide primaries in Texas, many pundits predicted turnout would signal a Democratic wave that might even lead to Democratic victories in November, even in that traditionally conservative state. The results showed Democratic voter enthusiasm is real, but that Republicans aren’t yet throwing in the towel. There were in excess of 1 million votes cast by Texas Democrats, more than double their 2014 turnout and the party’s largest turnout since 2002. But 1.4 million Republicans turned out to vote, an increase of 14 percent over the 2014 midterm primaries and the highest number of GOP primary votes since 2010. While November’s general elections remain dicey for Republicans nationwide because of normal mid-term trends, the Texas primaries suggest two things: predictions of Democratic enthusiasm are coming true, but predictions that dispirited Republican voters will opt to stay home are not (so far).
A big loss
President Trump’s decision to slap tariffs on imported steel and aluminum has been widely criticized by many outside the White House. It also cost Trump an important person inside his administration. Gary Cohn, a voice for free trade and Trump’s top economic adviser the past 14 months, resigned Tuesday after losing the tariff fight with his boss. Cohn had played a key role in pushing the Republican tax cut bill, and he championed many of the administration’s moves to reduce burdensome regulations. In an editorial, The Wall Street Journal said successful presidents need allies, and Trump has had them. But “the tariff decision is a leadership fiasco that has cost Mr. Trump a key ally in Gary Cohn,” the Journal wrote. “It is a loss, and this presidency cannot afford more like it.”