“It's time for them to have measurable objectives.” Yes!! Excellent, Brent, thank you. And *not* the measurable objectives they already seem to have, which are:
1 enforcing Sanctuary City rules that do nothing for taxpayers
Remember, in the Liberal universe and mindset, its intentions that count, not results. Vague ideas and platitudes, are just warm and fuzzy feel good expressions, that for those who are not driven by profits and results, seem to satisfy their purpose for existence. In the real business world, if you don’t produce, build or create, you fail, go out of business, or fired. It’s obvious that too many public “Servants “ are over compensated and under produce.
Quantifiable objectives, performance metrics and accountability are essential to running a successful private business. The attraction of government employment is obscene over compensation without accountability. My experience in working at publically funded institutions (NASA JPL CalTech) vs private companies is a stark contrast of work ethic and accountability vs a culture of entitlement, arrogence and laziness. Don't expect that public sector employees will ever submit to quantifiable performance standards, it is antithetical to the culture.
After reading your column, Brent, which lays out very well the incredible salaries and benefits that the city administrator and assistant city administrator are raking in, one can only wonder if it is possible for Santa Barbara to continue to function much longer at this pace of obscene government salaries. The really frustrating part is that once they leave this job without accomplishing anything positive for our town, they will still be handsomely rewarded by taxpayer money. This travesty has obviously been going on for years and years but has reached new highs,to the point where an eventual collapse seems inevitable. It is not a matter of "if" it will happen but "when".
Your idea of making government officials Accountable by delineating, specific yearly goals, and then reviewing the accomplishments is laudable. Good luck getting any of them to do it. All they do is find ways to not be held accountable. Deflection and obfuscation are their best tricks.
These ‘goals’ are shocking. Anyone who has ever worked in a professional environment (most for a lower paycheck than the one mentioned here) knows that goals have to be ‘SMART’. Specific, measurable, achieve able, realistic and time-dependent.
Something is rotten at the top end of SB city government.
Brent, the issue is not the salary, but the measurable short and long value that this provides for our investment. I am a student of J. Edwards Deming who espouses those same principles, all based on measurable results, in his quality movement. Well written!
Sounds like a boondoggle to me, Brent. Thanks for bringing up the hiring of a Deputy City Administrator assistant to provide "help" for "Ms. Magoo." As Gary Smythe describes herein the position as a "just a warm and fuzzy feel-good expressions." Nearly the entire SB City Government exists on a warm and fuzzy foundation of feelings. Their titles present a guessing game as to what individuals might actually do. These fancy titles exhibit a vague responsibility as to their reason for a big-dollar existence. As an engineer, there was never a question as for my existence when working at a company. And I was certain my existence could always be measured; gauged by providing a portion of the company dollar income. A so-called City Administrator is clearly one of those city government positions that can continue for eons. And without showing any beneficial results, always coming up with an excuse of blaming the general public for her not being able to fulfill some obligation(s) Ms. Magoo accepted. The City of Santa Barbara continues to Go Wild!
As described at the City's website provided: "The City of Santa Barbara's Sustainability & Resilience Department supports a sustainable, healthy, and safe Santa Barbara through building energy efficiency and renewable energy, reducing City-wide greenhouse gas emissions, recycling, composting, keeping our City clean from litter and waste, and implementing creek restoration and water quality improvement efforts.
Great example of BS. There are already people covering these things listed. Do we need someone to "watch" what others are already doing? I say BOONDOGGLE!
One day in the late 1960's, an office mate and engineer named Sy Horowitz, and I walked over to a place during lunchtime using a pathway under the 405 Freeway. The place we frequented was FedMart which later Price Club in Van Nuys located in the San Fernando Valley. As if it was yesterday, I can recall Sy's conversation about how he felt there were too many services being created in the country. Sy was product oriented and believed more in making tangible things which he would describe as products. Sy believed you had a purpose in life when physically or mentally did something that could be sold as being useful. Sy's comments always stuck with me. When Sy said something, I listened. Sy graduated from Penn State where the world's earliest digital computer was developed in the 1950's. Sy went on to work at Univac which he told me many fascinating stories about the computer designers and the development and installation of these early vacuum tube computers.
Many of us believe all the layers of government from City to Federal are comprised of mostly people being non-producers of anything tangible. Simply stated, government is the ideal place for someone that can't do anything productive. It's the place to be, such as Kamala Harris, where one can get away with looking good and knowing nothing. I'm reminded of Ann's sister working for the County of San Luis Obispo stating she never answered her phone during the week and would only listen to the calls on Friday and delete most of them. There's an incredible amount of all-government waste. I rarely could get a response from the City of SB when it came to safety issues. I'm a safety nut.
During the time when I was sharing an office with Sy, his wife divorced him and Sy kept his two boys. Sy was very depressed during this time. His wife wanted to be an assistant writer in Hollywood and so she left the marriage. One of his boys is now more known as Scott "Doc' Horowitz (retired) which became an astronaut piloting four Space Shuttle missions.
Brent- Thank you for laying out the numbers, depressing as hell. The phrase "circling the drain" comes to mind when I think about the future of our city.
While I have reservations about AI, I can see an application where it could run this city infinitely more efficiently and layout a comprehensive plan to accomplish goals.
McAdoo is being paid huge money to articulate her vision...not results. No doubt, the warm bodies occupying space in City Hall would vehemently object alongside their union buddies (also a good sign).
it would be instructive...and potentially entertaining...for someone in the private sector familiar w/ AI to concurrently operate a shadow city government utilizing the objectives stated by McAdoo and compare results...and costs. No harm. No foul. I can't imagine it would cost very much, but I believe there aren't plenty of us who would throw in a few bucks to experiment with such a program? Would not the half million dollars the City Council gave to the illegal alien community been better used for that purpose?
If AI can replace workers…it does...why not replace the overpaid and over pensioned bureaucrats? Not only would we actually get results, I imagine it would be dramatically more efficient and economical. Also, using that same platform to compare each City department from public works, permitting, maintenance, etc., with the private sector for those same functions.
About a million dollars out the door between these two — my! That’s some incredible savings. I predict the deputy’s big move will be recommending hiring someone to do whatever it was she was going to do that he was going to do.
I don't want to be overly pessimistic about this but very specific measurable outcomes will not fix govt. Unlike the private sector where profit is the universal measurement for success, there is nothing even remotely like that in the public sector. What many people don't understand (I know because I spent 5 years as an administrator in the public sector) is that government is systemically unable to succeed in terms of efficiency and great cost-effective outcomes. It never has and never will.
Perfectly summarized review of Kelly McAdoo’s vague and nonspecific “to do” list. It seems as though her list is a list of New Year’s resolutions instead of a procedure / performance manual of her job requirements. Who determined what her duties were prior to when she was hired? With whom did she negotiate such an unbelievably favorable salary and its many perks?!! It’s no wonder Santa Barbara’s spending money it doesn’t have. Who reviews her job?? This was well timed article on McAdoo’s job.
With this pay package and no measurable results in 1 year … it’s time to move on. The pool of public/private talent is vast. When citizens should not have to set a measurable performance (that’s the job of an administrator). Does Santa Barbara need a ‘volunteer’ citizens council to advise the elected ones that don’t seem to engage? Great cities have been steered from good to great by community leaders for thousands of years.
It wasn't all that long ago that Elon Musk and DOGE demanded that Government employees respond to an email with a written reply stating what they had accomplished on their job the previous week. Those unwilling or incapable of justifying their existence on the payroll were encouraged to resign and take a buy-out, thus reducing the deadwood in the civil servant forest. I'd like to see a similar accountability posted online for citizens to see the hard work our employees are being compensated for.
“It's time for them to have measurable objectives.” Yes!! Excellent, Brent, thank you. And *not* the measurable objectives they already seem to have, which are:
1 enforcing Sanctuary City rules that do nothing for taxpayers
2 enhancing their own living standard
3 pleasing the Sacramento D powers
4 blocking oil production
5 making sure no criminal is kept in jail
Remember, in the Liberal universe and mindset, its intentions that count, not results. Vague ideas and platitudes, are just warm and fuzzy feel good expressions, that for those who are not driven by profits and results, seem to satisfy their purpose for existence. In the real business world, if you don’t produce, build or create, you fail, go out of business, or fired. It’s obvious that too many public “Servants “ are over compensated and under produce.
Quantifiable objectives, performance metrics and accountability are essential to running a successful private business. The attraction of government employment is obscene over compensation without accountability. My experience in working at publically funded institutions (NASA JPL CalTech) vs private companies is a stark contrast of work ethic and accountability vs a culture of entitlement, arrogence and laziness. Don't expect that public sector employees will ever submit to quantifiable performance standards, it is antithetical to the culture.
After reading your column, Brent, which lays out very well the incredible salaries and benefits that the city administrator and assistant city administrator are raking in, one can only wonder if it is possible for Santa Barbara to continue to function much longer at this pace of obscene government salaries. The really frustrating part is that once they leave this job without accomplishing anything positive for our town, they will still be handsomely rewarded by taxpayer money. This travesty has obviously been going on for years and years but has reached new highs,to the point where an eventual collapse seems inevitable. It is not a matter of "if" it will happen but "when".
Yep.
Your idea of making government officials Accountable by delineating, specific yearly goals, and then reviewing the accomplishments is laudable. Good luck getting any of them to do it. All they do is find ways to not be held accountable. Deflection and obfuscation are their best tricks.
These ‘goals’ are shocking. Anyone who has ever worked in a professional environment (most for a lower paycheck than the one mentioned here) knows that goals have to be ‘SMART’. Specific, measurable, achieve able, realistic and time-dependent.
Something is rotten at the top end of SB city government.
Brent, the issue is not the salary, but the measurable short and long value that this provides for our investment. I am a student of J. Edwards Deming who espouses those same principles, all based on measurable results, in his quality movement. Well written!
Sounds like a boondoggle to me, Brent. Thanks for bringing up the hiring of a Deputy City Administrator assistant to provide "help" for "Ms. Magoo." As Gary Smythe describes herein the position as a "just a warm and fuzzy feel-good expressions." Nearly the entire SB City Government exists on a warm and fuzzy foundation of feelings. Their titles present a guessing game as to what individuals might actually do. These fancy titles exhibit a vague responsibility as to their reason for a big-dollar existence. As an engineer, there was never a question as for my existence when working at a company. And I was certain my existence could always be measured; gauged by providing a portion of the company dollar income. A so-called City Administrator is clearly one of those city government positions that can continue for eons. And without showing any beneficial results, always coming up with an excuse of blaming the general public for her not being able to fulfill some obligation(s) Ms. Magoo accepted. The City of Santa Barbara continues to Go Wild!
As described at the City's website provided: "The City of Santa Barbara's Sustainability & Resilience Department supports a sustainable, healthy, and safe Santa Barbara through building energy efficiency and renewable energy, reducing City-wide greenhouse gas emissions, recycling, composting, keeping our City clean from litter and waste, and implementing creek restoration and water quality improvement efforts.
Great example of BS. There are already people covering these things listed. Do we need someone to "watch" what others are already doing? I say BOONDOGGLE!
One day in the late 1960's, an office mate and engineer named Sy Horowitz, and I walked over to a place during lunchtime using a pathway under the 405 Freeway. The place we frequented was FedMart which later Price Club in Van Nuys located in the San Fernando Valley. As if it was yesterday, I can recall Sy's conversation about how he felt there were too many services being created in the country. Sy was product oriented and believed more in making tangible things which he would describe as products. Sy believed you had a purpose in life when physically or mentally did something that could be sold as being useful. Sy's comments always stuck with me. When Sy said something, I listened. Sy graduated from Penn State where the world's earliest digital computer was developed in the 1950's. Sy went on to work at Univac which he told me many fascinating stories about the computer designers and the development and installation of these early vacuum tube computers.
Many of us believe all the layers of government from City to Federal are comprised of mostly people being non-producers of anything tangible. Simply stated, government is the ideal place for someone that can't do anything productive. It's the place to be, such as Kamala Harris, where one can get away with looking good and knowing nothing. I'm reminded of Ann's sister working for the County of San Luis Obispo stating she never answered her phone during the week and would only listen to the calls on Friday and delete most of them. There's an incredible amount of all-government waste. I rarely could get a response from the City of SB when it came to safety issues. I'm a safety nut.
During the time when I was sharing an office with Sy, his wife divorced him and Sy kept his two boys. Sy was very depressed during this time. His wife wanted to be an assistant writer in Hollywood and so she left the marriage. One of his boys is now more known as Scott "Doc' Horowitz (retired) which became an astronaut piloting four Space Shuttle missions.
I agree with you that there should be clear objectives and accountability. And the four-point objectives you listed to grossly too vague.
But I'm curious if those overly simplified four objectives - taken from a noozhawk interview -actually capture the Administrator's duties?
Either way, accountability in this city seems to be in short supply.
Brent- Thank you for laying out the numbers, depressing as hell. The phrase "circling the drain" comes to mind when I think about the future of our city.
While I have reservations about AI, I can see an application where it could run this city infinitely more efficiently and layout a comprehensive plan to accomplish goals.
McAdoo is being paid huge money to articulate her vision...not results. No doubt, the warm bodies occupying space in City Hall would vehemently object alongside their union buddies (also a good sign).
it would be instructive...and potentially entertaining...for someone in the private sector familiar w/ AI to concurrently operate a shadow city government utilizing the objectives stated by McAdoo and compare results...and costs. No harm. No foul. I can't imagine it would cost very much, but I believe there aren't plenty of us who would throw in a few bucks to experiment with such a program? Would not the half million dollars the City Council gave to the illegal alien community been better used for that purpose?
If AI can replace workers…it does...why not replace the overpaid and over pensioned bureaucrats? Not only would we actually get results, I imagine it would be dramatically more efficient and economical. Also, using that same platform to compare each City department from public works, permitting, maintenance, etc., with the private sector for those same functions.
About a million dollars out the door between these two — my! That’s some incredible savings. I predict the deputy’s big move will be recommending hiring someone to do whatever it was she was going to do that he was going to do.
I don't want to be overly pessimistic about this but very specific measurable outcomes will not fix govt. Unlike the private sector where profit is the universal measurement for success, there is nothing even remotely like that in the public sector. What many people don't understand (I know because I spent 5 years as an administrator in the public sector) is that government is systemically unable to succeed in terms of efficiency and great cost-effective outcomes. It never has and never will.
Perfectly summarized review of Kelly McAdoo’s vague and nonspecific “to do” list. It seems as though her list is a list of New Year’s resolutions instead of a procedure / performance manual of her job requirements. Who determined what her duties were prior to when she was hired? With whom did she negotiate such an unbelievably favorable salary and its many perks?!! It’s no wonder Santa Barbara’s spending money it doesn’t have. Who reviews her job?? This was well timed article on McAdoo’s job.
With this pay package and no measurable results in 1 year … it’s time to move on. The pool of public/private talent is vast. When citizens should not have to set a measurable performance (that’s the job of an administrator). Does Santa Barbara need a ‘volunteer’ citizens council to advise the elected ones that don’t seem to engage? Great cities have been steered from good to great by community leaders for thousands of years.
It wasn't all that long ago that Elon Musk and DOGE demanded that Government employees respond to an email with a written reply stating what they had accomplished on their job the previous week. Those unwilling or incapable of justifying their existence on the payroll were encouraged to resign and take a buy-out, thus reducing the deadwood in the civil servant forest. I'd like to see a similar accountability posted online for citizens to see the hard work our employees are being compensated for.