My Favorite Gov'ment Bureaucracy to hate!!

[MountainDon]

That would be the state child care licensing department. They have more rules, some good, some nonsensical, than you can shake a stick at. [Our livelihood is operating a preschool facility] I just received a phone call from one of our inspectors, the one that overseas the nutrition program. Gotta make sure we feed the little ones enriched white flour based crackers, etc.

Anyhow I made a colossal error on last months report! She had to stop right then and there and call to berate me. Two of the kids had a birthday in December and I hadn't changed their age from 3 to 4!      What a waste of her time and mine. I asked what difference it meant; knowing full well there was no real difference to anything that really matters. She went into the explanation regarding that at a certain age the kids no longer qualify for the food reimbursement program (let 'em go hungry at that time?) When she was finished, I asked her if she recalled the ages of the kids we have enrolled (3 to 5 and not a minute younger or older)?

She thought for a sec and then said :Oh, I see what you mean. Your children would never become ineligible, you don't have them that old." To which I politely responded "That's correct. "Then she said they had to keep the forms neat and correct before they file them. What Crap!

The best thing about retiring fully in a few years will be not having to deal with the minions who 'work' in that department. They do something about twice a year to tick me off!

[MountainDon]

@#$%!!!

She just called back. I'm such a bad boy! For the drinks that were served, the form we send in states "apple juice". Been that way for over two decades. Now I have to state "100% apple juice".    She must not have enough actual work to do, so she has to make it look like she's a valued employee. Wonder how many copies there are to the reports she fills out to document these calls.

[Homegrown Tomatoes]

Good grief!!!!  Sounds about like the county health department when my oldest was a baby... I was on the WIC program because with DH in school and me staying home, we couldn't afford not to be.  When my daughter would gain any weight, it was always surpassed by her height, and she was always off the charts tall and off the charts underweight.  She ate like mad and just didn't gain weight, yet she was obviously healthy and active.  One of the county nurses labelled her as 'failure to thrive' and sent me to the nutritionist who had me list everything she'd eaten in a week (and it was a LONG list because she never met a food she didn't like!)  While I'm filling out the mountain of paperwork, DD was crawling everywhere and getting into everything and asking every two seconds, "What's this?  What's that?"  (Some of her first words.)  All the sudden, the nutritionist looked at her and busted up laughing and said, "Anyone with half a brain could see there's nothing in the world wrong with that child!"

[ScottA]

"Anyone with half a brain could see there's nothing in the world wrong with that child!"

maybe that's the problem...less than half a brain.

[tanya]

Oh yes, the govt. agency that is supposed to protect and serve.  Who thier own fat asses I say.  Today isn't the day to get me started but I expect soon. 

[tanya]

Oh that sounds like i mean the cops, but I am referring to the state protection agencies.  They are professionals alright professional dumbasses.  Certified even!!!

[tanya]

A recent news story tells of a child protection agency social worker who is trying so hard to find another methadone treatment program for a mother who got kicked out of her methadone program for drving there drunk with her three year old.  The social worker is worried because the mother is already suffering withdrawals and can't find a program that will take her and the social worker is trying so hard to keep this woman's children with her??? 

OK now I am not seeing a bit of interest for the safety of these children?  The mother drove drunk with the child to her methadone program? 

Of course staying off alcohol and other drugs is a requirement of the methadone program the mix of methadone and alcohol is a death wish. 

IMHO that social worker should be spending her time looking for safe placement for those kids instead of accomodating the mothers non compliance.

OF course she had the news reporter with her so she needs to show jsut how overworked she is well IMHO she might not be so overowrked if she would pull her head out of her ass and put the safety of the kids as her priority first!!!!  NOW in a day or two who is to say that same client isn't going to get kicked out of yet another program and in  the meantime these helpless kids have a mom using methadone, alcohol and who knows what else with the social worker helping accomodating the mom rather than making sure they are safe.  I would fire that ignorant bitch if I were the supervisor. 

[desdawg]

There must be a special school for dummies that will be hired by agencies like that. I just received a letter from the AZ Dept of Revenue regarding a sales tax return from December of 2005. The letter states that is was misapplied in November, a full month before it was due and a refund check was sent to me, cashed and cleared their bank in November, before it was due. Bottom line, if I just send them $298.10 it will all go away.    So what I have to do is go and dig through records from 2005 to correct their mistake. And no, don't bill them for my time as this is just a cost of doing business. I shut my business down near the end of September of 2007 so I don't need any more costs. To anyone who is thinking of starting a business you would be way better off being a handyman and flying below the radar. If you try to play by the rules you will find out that the interpretation of those rules by, as Don puts it  "minions",  will drive you crazy. I shut down, stopped contracting work, and just want to walk away but noooooooo 

[glenn kangiser]

I try to charge an extra $1000 or so on prevailing wage jobs -- read . paid for with taxpayers money, to take care of the paperwork that is sure to follow over the next couple of years after the job is done.

Government watch dogs paid for by the unions who lose work to me will try to see to it that I am hassled for a couple years.  No wonder the corporations send work overseas or hire illegals.

[ScottA]

The system is set up to be hard on small business owners who can't afford full time accountants. Big business is set up to deal with the red tape but it strangles the little guy. See a trend here?

[desdawg]

I worked on a job at the Denver Federal Center many years ago. The company I worked for was non-union when we started but not by the time the job finished. I was a laborer at the time, new to construction work. When the job began I was paid union scale + benefits (all in my paycheck). Then I had to join the Laborers Union and took a paycut since the union collected the benefits. Finally I decided to join the carpenters union and started in the apprenticeship program. That would have been about 1971. I have been building things in one way, shape, form or another every since. Anyway the Davis-Bacon Act and pressure from the unions changed that contractors way of doing business forever more. Here in AZ we are a right to work state and the unions aren't very strong.

[tanya]

Today it is the mental health services.  My oldest son has schitzophrenia.  He has been home since shortly before Thanksginving doing very well and seemed to be setteling in nicely.  Well this morning out of hte blue he woke up yelling to get this cat away from him... and broke up a chair.  well there are no cats inthe hosue and no dogs either so I said whats the matter?  He didn't know, said he wasn't having a bad dream or anything and calmed down.  Experience has taught me that I have to demand accountability gor this kind of behavior so I told him it is time for you to go back to your own life.  I look in his back pack to see if he is taking his meds....low and behold!!!! I find an entire YEARS worth of anti psychotics!!!!  Huge bottles of the most potent pills onthe market.  Well I tell him he has to go because things usually end up going downhill pretty fast after he starts to psych out and I think he should get back to his town and get back on trackwith his mental health person.  So I call the guardian to make sure his check is sent to the right place and then I call themental health lady who assures me that he is indeed med compliant... BS... She goes on to say that she knows he has this stash of meds, that he is also supposed to be taking anti anciety... that he was kicked out of hte homelss shelter for violence and that she had really hoped he would do well at my house???  So I am pissed off!!! I feel like THAT agency has a mandate to stabalize patients who are experiencing psychosis and specifically violence.  Don't send them off into the world hoping all will go fine.  Now when he arrivd here he had tennis shoes without laces, short sleeved shirts, a coat that didn't zip, no hat, no socks...you get the picture.  I did manage to get him boots and socks and some other items so I think as long as he gets back to his town he should be fine.  Well I have called there several times to see if  he has arrived or for an update and she hasn't even bothered to call me back neither has the guardian.  He left here at 8 am and I called them immediately to give them the heads up and make it known that he probably would need some specific care.  I called her back at 4 pm after calling a half dozen times for an update and still nothing....   I left a message that if I don't hear back I am calling the Adult Protective Services who is supposedly monitoring his care?  Honestly I am wondering if anyone is monitoring anything other than their fat asses and their pay checks.  EVERY ONE OF THESE AGENCIES AND THIER EMPLOYEES IS UNDER THE WASHINGTON DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL AND HEALTH SERVICES UMBRELLA.  AND WE WONDER WHY THE TAXPAYERS PAY SO MUCH FOR THE PERSISTANT LAWSUITS AND MISTAKES OF THAT AGENCY.  MY CONTENTION IS THAT THEIR POLICY IS NOT A MISTAKE IT IS A CRIMMINAL WAY OF DOING BUSINESS THAT CALLS FOR STONEWALLING ANYONE AND EVERYTHING THAT MAY MAKE THEM TAKE SOME RESPONSIBILITY!!!  or Show some accountability, these "workers" get a decent pay check, they think the homelss shelter is adequate housing, they say a client who is packing around A LOT of unused meds is medication compliant?  They don't bother to tell people they are sending a violent psychotic into their home, etc. etc. etc.  And then when they are put on the spot they refuse to take the phone calls.  I am really pissed off here and I think I will call the lawyer tomorrow maybe that will wake them up. NOT LIKELY because they continue their policy and processes despite repeatedly being called upon by the courts to improve.  I think the feds should hold them accountable they are bad EVIL crimminals.  Oh the case manager jsut called I went off, I was resepctful but I made my point in NO uncertain terms.  They still have not heard from him and I am even more worried.  It is cold and snowing here and it just makes me sick.   

[glenn kangiser]

Most parasitic agencies are not very efficient or caring.

[Sassy]

POLICE STATE, USA
SWAT officers invade home, take 11-year-old at gunpoint
Cops demand boy go to doctor because of fall during horseplay
Posted: January 7, 2008
1:00 a.m. Eastern

By Bob Unruh
© 2008 WorldNetDaily.com

Nearly a dozen members of a police SWAT team in western Colorado punched a hole in the front door and invaded a family's home with guns drawn, demanding that an 11-year-old boy who had had an accidental fall accompany them to the hospital, on the order of Garfield County Magistrate Lain Leoniak.

The boy's parents and siblings were thrown to the floor at gunpoint and the parents were handcuffed in the weekend assault, and the boy's father told WND it was all because a paramedic was upset the family preferred to care for their son themselves.

Someone, apparently the unidentified paramedic, called police, the sheriff's office and social services, eventually providing Leoniak with a report that generated the magistrate's court order to the sheriff's office for the SWAT team assault on the family's home in a mobile home development outside of Glenwood Springs, the father, Tom Shiflett, told WND.

(Story continues at link)

http://wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=59566

[tanya]

There has to be a better system these agencies are so bad.  They all seem tot hink that what they think or say is more important than what the people who they are serving think or have to say.  I can tell you that IF anyone had bothered to tell me that my son was not able to go back tot he homeless shelter I certainly would not have sent him down the highway backt ot here.  IN fact I don't even think his guardian was informed because she has been trying to get him in the town where her offices are for years this would be the perfect time.  I am pretty worried still because he was having troubles before he left forgetting what he was doing when he was dishing up his plate and looking for his shoes but forgetting what he was looking for etc. etc.  The point here is that if the mental health practitioner would have said he needs this medication this many times a day, he has no where else to live, and he is volitile...BEFORE there were problems,  maybe I could have used that information to find the right help. Instead he is out in the cold under 10 degrees here this morning, with nowhere  to stay.  And she tells me all of this after the fact!!!  Even if I had known after he got to my house I could have worked withthe guardian so she could have found a place in her town for him.  My position is that the DSHS MUST be dismantled and the money should be used to open a 24 hour crisis services retreat in each and every town.  It is very apparant to me that these agencies thrive on others misery and instead of mitigating that misery they increase it at every opportunity with thier policy and practices.  A simply place where people can go to be warm, eat do laundry and sleep, and get referrals for other help, until they get back on track would do far more to make a real difference than these case "workers" who do nothing but fill out forms and talk on the phone all day. 

[glenn kangiser]

It's hard to make them care.  They have nothing to lose.

[tanya]

Well even the police are looking for him now and NOTHING.  I just get more and more worried it is very unusual that he hasn't called to at least get his check wired to him.  I am just hoping htat he found a place to stay and is going the rest of the way today.  What a mess.  He wouldn't even take the food I tried to send with him.  I am so pissed off.  First at them for thier poor management but also at him because it never fails he does well for so long and then he psychs out and I am the one left all worried.   

[Sassy]

Hope you hear from him soon, I know how much worry a kid can cause...  my oldest son has Tourettes & also was diagnosed with ADHD (if that is real - he was VERY active), OCD - he/we had a rough time while he was growing up, even now I worry about him although he is doing well.  You never stop being a mother...

I've dealt with a lot of gov't bureaucracies - some were helpful, others not...   

BTW, here's another gov't bureaucracy to hate...  IRS!!!  here's an interesting link to questions & answers

http://www.supremelaw.org/sls/31answers.htm

http://consciouschoice.com/2006/10/aaronrusso0610.html

[tanya]

Well my kid came back he was stuck at the gas station forty miles away all night warm and they gave him free food too.  Nice folks at that place.  All the agencies are bending over backwards to get things back on track and he is taking his meds today so for now it is peaceful but I am exhausted.  On top of that we got about three inches of snow over night and then it started to rain so I had to shovel that dang driveway again.  Rain in January is not a common occurance here. 

[Redoverfarm]

Here is an article regarding building fees and permits and how one individual hid in the hay to avoid his.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=510161&in_page_id=1770

[glenn kangiser]

Good job, farmer.  Hope he prevails.