Just when you thought the reputation of faceless bureaucrats couldn't sink any lower, two examples in this last week from Baltimore City remind us that government functionaries know no limits in their ability to blindly follow regulations.
The Baltimore Sun's Justin Fenton reported on the case of Andrew Leonard, whose door was knocked down by police executing a search warrant. The police had the wrong house. Mr. Leonard figured the city ought to pay for a new door, but the city thought otherwise. The officers went to the address listed on the warrant - even though they really meant to raid a house two doors down - so, as far as the city is concerned, he's out of luck.
To add insult to injury, he put the old front door in the back yard and called for bulk trash pickup, which never showed. Instead, he got a $50 fine from a code inspector for having trash lying around.
In the same day's paper, Annie Linskey reported on the travails of Oles Envelope Corporation. The century-old local firm had to plead its case to get a contract to provide return envelopes for water bills in the face of vociferous opposition from a city official - even though it submitted the low bid.
It seems Oles didn't include the city's return address on the sample they sent in for consideration, and the flap lacked all-important glue. Did the city call to ask if the missing address could be included, or to inquire about the lack of adhesive? Not so much. Instead, they decided this intransigence was severe enough that they should go with another company - costing the city an extra $13,000 and giving business to a firm in Florida instead of a Baltimore company that employs nearly 100 people.
Even as Oles customer service rep Mark Jones' protest at the Board of Estimates was catching Mayor Sheila Dixon's attention, the official who rejected the bid, City Purchasing Agent Cecil Moore, continued to insist he had been in the right. The Oles sample envelope didn't meet every detail of the bid specs, and nothing else mattered - not helping a local firm, and not even saving taxpayers $13,000.
In the end, Ms. Dixon and the other members of the board did the right thing and gave the contract to Oles. Mr. Jones says he also got some crucial help from Comptroller Joan Pratt's office in putting together his bid protest, so all is not brain dead over at City Hall.
But the case of Mr. Leonard has not come to quite so satisfactory a resolution. After The Sun printed his story, Ms. Dixon's administration magnanimously agreed to refund the $50 fine. Both the mayor's office and the police commissioner's office have offered their sympathy, but so far not the $1,200 it cost to repair and replace the door. It seems to be caught up somewhere in, you guessed it, the bureaucracy.
Ms. Dixon has made it a hallmark of her tenure to pay attention to quality of life issues in a way that puts a human face on the city. She should deliver Mr. Leonard's check herself, personally apologize and publicly reprimand whoever crafted a legalistic rejection of the claim without the slightest thought of what is right or fair. That way she'll get the message across to citizens and bureaucrats alike that this city is being run with some common sense.
