It Was Only $1,750,000.00

This is a two part question. Part one:

What can you buy for $1.75 million?

This house in Connecticut.

Maybe four of these with gas money left over.

Don’t want to drive to Connecticut, then maybe buy one of these,

or

you could like the Kentucky Retirement Systems buy this.

The Kentucky Retirement Systems paid $1,724,556.93 from fiscal year 2007 to 2011 for other professional services to L R WECHSLER LTD.

And this is what they got.

"LRWL assisted KRS in the following areas:

Review of KRS operations in order to identify opportunities for improvement

Identification of technology enablers to improve KRS operating efficiencies

Establishing a comprehensive set of metrics, i.e., measurements, that will enable KRS to gauge the degree of improvement achieved after implementation of the recommendations to be developed.

Conducting a SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) analysis.

Developing an actionable item listing – grouped based upon their anticipated time frame to complete, their relative potential benefit, and their ease of implementation.

Preparing implementation guidelines – for both the short and long term items in the actionable item listing that have been determined to of high benefit and simple to implement.

Identification of sample metrics for each of the actionable items to be implemented.

Preparation of a final report of operational opportunities for change as well as any reorganization suggestions.

Beyond this, services were provided in the following areas:

Development of the FY 2006 Capital budget for Information Technology projects.

Preparation of pertinent Requests for Information or Requests for Proposal associated with specific technology initiatives recommended in the operational and organizational assessment.
Assistance with the institutionalization and implementation of the Continuous Process Improvement program delineated in initial assessment.

LRWL then developed RFPs and conducted procurements for: an agency wide telephone system and call center capability (Avaya was selected); an agency wide integrated financial solution (a Great Plains solution implementer was selected); an agency wide LOB application to replace then current legacy and imaging applications. The RFPs, evaluation criteria, product demonstration scenarios, reference checking scripts, and assistance in the selection process were all provided by LRWL.

Additionally, LRWL analyzed the current state of KRS member and retiree data – and developed recommendations related to going forward.

Oversight project management and quality assurance were provided to the line of business implementation."

Here is part two of the question. Why do you pay a consultant $1.75 million when you have a Department of State Government that already does the same thing?

Gubernatorial Candidate Tax Plans

You want the Governor to be a big picture kind of guy. They need to come up with the idea and then have an army of policy analysts to flesh it out. That is why the op-ed page of the Herald Leader is so disappointing today.

Four candidates for Governor Give there stand on tax reform in the state. The two guys who have had multiple years and armies of policy people at their beck and call give the most miserable showing.

Current Governor Steve Beshear’s “position on taxes is clear and concise, strong and unwavering” to do nothing. He has no plan short of bringing Casinos to Kentucky.

Senate President David Williams takes five paragraphs before he says “Here’s my plan”. I’ve already posted about his plan or rather lack of a plan.

Louisville businessman Phil Moffett obviously without a staff of policy analysts has come with part of the answer. Moffett wants a flat tax on everything. Here again I’ve already discussed Moffett’s simple easy to understand half right answer.

Finally there is Gatewood Galbraith’s plan. You have to love Gatewood; he is the smartest man running for this office and has zero chance of winning. Without a staff of analysts Gatewood hits on some of the key points.

“corporate tax exemptions, which places a disproportionate burden on Kentucky's small businesses and wage earners”

“A modernized tax code is only one step in solving the problems of the commonwealth, but an important one”

“ad-hoc tax incentives ….. have relieved large corporate entities of paying their fair share of the budget”

“implement a service tax in addition to our sales tax”

“There is a long list of folks we would like to ease the burden on, including seniors over age 65 who make less than $30,000 per year, homeowners and parents with children in college, to name a few. But we won't know precisely who and how until we get into office.”

So, if I were grading this assignment on tax reform here are grades I would give them.

Steve Beshear F

David Williams F

Phil Moffett C-

Gatewood Galbraith B

I find it sad that the guy with no chance of winning has the best grasp of reality.