By Douglas V. Gibbs
Due to recent events in my life I have had to deal with government offices quite a bit. The more I get involved with government bureaucracy, the more they confirm to me my feelings about how government is not the solution. . . government is the problem.
Evan Sayet makes a living as a conservative comedian, which I believe is not hard to do, because the liberal left provides material at every turn. All we have to do is observe, and report, and the lunacy is so shocking we can't help but laugh at the idiots on the left.
Yes, that is right, Democrats. . . we are making fun of you, by simply retelling the truth.
Without going into details, for a few months now I have been working through injuries I received on the job. The Worker's Compensation lawyers are doing what they can to protect the pockets of the insurance company, and employer, and I am doing what I can to make sure I am able to properly heal using the system that is in place. Since the case is still in progress, that means I am eligible for Unemployment Disability Insurance until the lawyers are done yelling at each other.
When it was first applied for my case was denied, and then after repeal approved by the State disability insurance system. Then, over a month later I received the first check for two weeks of time off. More than a month later, I still have not seen a second payment. Two weeks of trying to contact the phone center has resulted in a constant, and consistent, number of opportunities to be hung up on by an automated system that begins with "Press 1 for English." Finally, this morning, I decided it was time to go down to my local office (that turns out to be over an hour drive away) to resolve the matter.
And that is when the fun began.
Understand, my injuries make it difficult for me to sit longer than about twenty minutes, or walk long distances.
Keep that in mind as I tell you the tale.
I decided to leave around 9:00 am to miss the worst of the morning traffic, and hopefully beat the afternoon traffic returning to my area of Southern California. Aside from some traffic from construction on a freeway, and having to stop a few times to get out of my car and walk around so that the long-term sitting didn't create too much pain, the trip to the office was uneventful.
As I got off the freeway, and began to drive up the main drag, I saw an unemployment office on the left, and decided to go in there, just in case my office for disability insurance had moved, and I didn't know about it.
The parking was wonderful, with plenty of spaces right next to the main entrance, and empty customer spaces all around the building. Given my difficulties walking long distances, the nearby parking was appreciated.
Once inside, I realized it was probably not the place I needed to be. It was a job center, but much unlike any I had ever seen.
My experiences with unemployment office job centers has always been a roomful of cubicles with a worker at each desk ready and eager to help the next person seek employment. In this office, there were two employees: The information desk person, and a security guard. The cubicles were nearly all filled with customers, tapping away on computers, on the internet. That's right, folks, the office was there so that people could use the online services they could have used at home.
That's it.
After signing in, waiting in line, and finding out I was in the wrong place, I drove up the street to where I needed to be. Unfortunately, the parking for the disability office, which services people with disabilities, did not offer as good as parking as the place for able-bodied folks receiving unemployment benefits.
The building I needed to go to was in a complex with a half a dozen buildings, and the disability office was in the back of the complex, tucked in the corner, with half a dozen "customer only" parking spaces near the door - all of which were occupied. The disabled parking spaces for the disability office were nowhere near. They were in the next parking lot, next to the next building to the east. All other parking in the complex were labeled "Permit Parking Only." About one in ten of those spaces was occupied by a vehicle.
The next closest parking for people needing to go to the disability office was on the street (which was limited due to construction, and all available spaces were occupied), or across the street. I found a space at the farthest point from the building I needed to go to. In the end, it turned out it took longer for me to make the trek to the office, than it was for me to spend time in the office.
Because of the long walk, I elected to leave my computer in the car, and take with me only my tablet and phone. I stopped twice during the long walk, to rest as my injuries were beginning to be a pain. I had expected a DMV style visit, sitting in a large room full of smelly people and crying babies, waiting for hours upon hours to be seen for a five minute visit. It turns out, the disability office is not that crowded, nor is it designed to handle such a crowd.
The building is large, filled with a massive amount of personnel manning a phone system that I was never able to get through to. The customer area was small. My master bathroom is larger. I have seen walk-in closets larger than the area for customers at the disability office. The room was designed sort of like a check cashing place, with a small bench to sit on, walls covered with various informational posters, a few forms on the wall, and a bulletproof glass window with a slide drawer between you and the customer service representative.
I was second in line once I signed in.
Signing in was interesting in its own right. The clipboard had a sign on the window above it, that said, "You must sign in to be assisted. Customers will be assisted in order of sign in."
But the clipboard was on the counter outside the window, on my side of the bulletproof glass. How was the guy behind the glass checking the clipboard? Could he even see it?
Before I could tap out a single sentence on my device to share the comedy of my visit with my valued readers, I was motioned to the window by the heavy-set man in a New York Yankees T-Shirt behind the glass. I explained my problem, and he slapped his hands on the keyboard with reckless abandon, ultimately determining my paperwork had a problem and that is why everything had been delayed. In other words, they received my paperwork I mailed after I received my first benefit, but the processing of the paperwork had been stopped.
I asked, "Did I make an error on the form?"
"Nope," he said. "It was our fault."
And it would never have been checked, and corrected if I had not made the long drive, and the long walk, to disability benefits central.
I made a reference to not being able to call in, and he motioned to the telephone action center behind him and said, "Nobody get's through."
One comment had been that if I ever did get through, it was a good indication my luck was ready to play the lottery.
He fixed my account, promised me everything was good and proper, and sent me on my merry way.
"Next," he said, without glancing at the clipboard. The only other person in the room was an old woman standing behind a line marked with tape on the floor to ensure the person next in line was far enough away they could not hear the person's personal information at the window. . . you know, about six feet away.
When I asked about being able to do the forms online I was informed it takes creating an account which includes using snail mail for a part of the process.
In line with a story I once wrote, I wondered if I would be fined for being willing to use paper forms in a system striving to be paperless, and commonsense-less.
Then I stepped outside, and prepared for the long walk to my car, realizing that bringing the computer had been a mistake since all it did was sit in my car while I was taking care of business. The other mistake was not bringing a canteen.
Bureaucracy at its finest.
The moral of the story? Perhaps that argument by liberals about voter idea laws, where they claim the poor are unable to get an identification card, is not so far fetched. . . not because the poor are not capable, but because the system is so screwed up it would take an Indiana Jones style trek just to get to the office, much less wade through the red tape and bureaucracy to get an ID.
-- Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary
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