I’m a professional engineer. I love building roads and bridges. I tell people I never got past building them in the sandbox. I understand how blessed I am to be able to combine passion with a vocation. Truth is, I would probably do it for free. Being a pro engineer, however, I get paid to do it. I get paid a lot. People don’t have to tell me how lucky I am.
Well, maybe lucky is not a good choice of words. I will leave it up to you to call going to engineering school for five years and working in both private industry and the public sector for over 15 years luck. In some ways it has been difficult to hone my craft to a point where I get to make decisions regarding the public safety and taxpayer funds. Your public safety. Your taxpayer dollars.
By my sights: It IS a delicate balance looking out for your daughter driving back from college on a dark road in the middle of the night while also being aware someone who really couldn’t afford it paid 37 cents a gallon or more in taxes to pay for safe roads. Times are tough. A single mom somewhere borrowed her child’s lunch money to put enough gas in her tank to get to work. Food or gasoline, not both (along with taxes on gas that are to go for the transportation projects’ repair, maintenance and new, safe bridges and roadways). Some company hired one less employee to offset the money they will be paying in gas taxes this year. I take the delicate balance seriously.
And, I am your advocate. My whole life has prepared me so that you would hire me to do this job. You trust my kind with billions of your dollars and something more precious. You trust me with the life of your family. I try to make a road or bridge as safe as I can with the money available.
I won’t let talk of ‘government incompetence’ interfere with my solemn obligation to the safety of the public, and the wise use of the public’s funds. I don’t allow the people who work for me to do/ think anything less than safety and wise use as we execute our projects. I demand excellence because my daughter’s life –your daughter’s life– might depend on it. Every dime we spend must further these goals.
Rhetoric about ‘government incompetence’, sadly, is sometimes a self-fulfilling prophesy. I am beginning to see it every day. I know times are tough. My relatives have faced layoffs. I know people who are not getting the raises they were promised in the private sector. Many of my fellow engineers in the private sector have been downsized and outsized while I continue to work. They however do not have to listen to the incessant drone which has become routine in my job daily. Their usefulness, character and competence are not questioned on a daily basis.
In the coming days, as we discuss the role of government, I would ask that we separate the rhetoric and its implications from the good and dedicated works of public servants.
Most of the public servants who save you from fires, criminals and being killed on a road on your way to work are good people who have chosen to serve you over the almighty buck. Do yourself a favor and look closely at the lies, damned lies, and the false statistics which some cite to prove how over-paid and fat government employees have become.
Delve into the nuance of the statistics you read which do not distinguish education levels or other salient information. Look closely at your trooper, fireman and the man who picks up busted tires from the road.
Think about the man who keeps those tire parts from coming through your daughter’s windshield. When you think of him, know that he is doing the job for pay just above the poverty line. Think about what some, maybe even you, say about him that is deleterious without also knowing the facts of the lives of those who serve. Think about what the workers’ “union” has done for them lately. Think about what you would like people to say about government workers, public servants if they were your sons, your daughters… Really think.
D. R. Welch is a civil engineer who lives with his wife and daughter. He has practiced engineering as an owner of a civil engineering firm and is now in the public sector. He understands both the perils of owning a small business and delivering the best transportation system possible to the taxpayer.