CONSULTANTS 

Here in Topeka the hot issue in May of 2007 was consultants. The Topeka Chamber paid $120,000 to a consultant to tell us what we need to stimulate economic development.

He told us Topeka is very ugly and needed to be beautified to stimulate economic development. And, we need to have a vibrant and beautiful downtown. What a surprise! This little wish list item has been in every consultant's report since 1968 at least.

The very next day after the consultant's report hit the front page here, seventy-five local citizens attended a special meeting where they were asked to donate $700,000 for yet another study. Needless to say, this created a lot of confusion.  (It later turned out that this one, too, was driven by the Topeka Chamber.) 

"A client with one consultant knows what to do. A client with two is never sure." -- Unknown

Forgive me if I'm jaded about consultants. Admittedly, I rely on several consultants, but do my darnest to make sure they are from Topeka or at least from Kansas.

One of the main uses of these "studies" by consultants is to justify spending a lot of money on something. The Augenblick & Myers Study, which the Kansas Supreme Court relied upon to order $700 million per year in additional school spending, is a prime example.

The Augenblick consulting firm has been an extremely dependable source of "school funding studies" that, in every case, find that states need to spend an average of $1 billion per year more than they are currently spending.

The Kansas report found that we needed to add about 20,000 more school employees to the 59,000 we already had, to support a dwindling number of students. (The money won't REALLY be spent to hire 20,000 people, and the Supreme Court knew it, but they ordered the money spent anyway.)

Two things you'll never hear from a consultant: 1) "How about paying us based on the success of our advice." 2) "I don't know enough to advise you on that."