When private firms take over public jobs, does the public win?
In the past several weeks I met with many local social workers who may lose their job under a budget proposal to privatize public services. This decision is under review by the budget committee.
The social workers are not complaining. They are sharing information about their successes and ideas on how to make the system better.
These workers properly sign up folks for health care and Food Share (formerly food stamps). Most counties run zero or very low error rates. They know local people. This knowledge helps provide quality services and even helps uncover fraud and illegal activities.
The Governor’s budget includes rules to centralize all of the sign-up for Medicaid through a computer-based system run by Hewlett-Packard Enterprise Services, Inc.
People would not meet face-to-face with a social worker. Instead they would sign-up on-line. Many are concerned this system would increase fraud and be very difficult to use for the disabled, elderly or those in rural
