No Laughing Matter

The Capital has some fun with this story, but it is actually quite serious:

During a routine meeting of the Legislative Policy Committee yesterday, lawmakers questioned the deluge of reports that gushes out each April.

The 2007 session created 34 new commissions, task forces, boards and advisory councils; 153 new reports to the General Assembly and its committees; and 170 reports to budget committees.

Frequently, the legislature is told that these studies can be done with existing resources. The sheer number, however, has made House Republican Leader Anthony O'Donnell, R-Calvert, a skeptic.

"As we go into tough budget times, we have to start looking at the cost," he said. "If you've got 400 or 500 (reports), I guarantee you're not doing it within existing resources."

With the state facing a $1.5 billion deficit next year, there was little disagreement on the other side of the aisle.

"I think it's a point well taken," said Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller, Jr., D-Calvert. "It's taxing our resources, for sure."

The Department of Health and Mental Hygiene will have to develop 76 reports as a result of mandates from the 2007 legislature.

It will surprise nobody to figure out that the reason bureaucracy is continually expanding is the continuing need to find reasons to justify expanding the bureaucracy. The sheer amount of reports produced annually by a state such as Maryland is staggering...yet it is nothing compared to what the Federal Government outputs every year in reports, studies, and commissions.

The irony, as Minority Whip (and fellow GSPM alum) Chris Shank notes:

"The 'Committee on Committees...I knew it would happen."

But it really is no laughing matter. Something has to be done in order to curb the waste of time, money, and resources poured into committees, commissions, and the like every year. Unfortunately, that something is going to have to come from the General Assembly. Since most of these commissions and reports, as noted in the story, are legislatively mandated, it is going to take legislative action to remove these reporting requirements and to disassemble these commissions. And since a lot of these commissions and reports address niche issues and placate certain political pressure groups, the likelihood of meaningful reform in this area is slim despite the clear and present budget danger on our horizon...