There have several feeble attempts to move the bureaucracy out of Washington DC and closer to the people the behemoth serves. The most logical is the Department of Agriculture. With over 100,000 employees in 29 different agencies ranging from Agricultural Marketing to Rural Housing Services and 4500 locations, the center of our farming regulations is 1000 miles away from the breadbasket of the country. Why isn’t it located in the middle of the country where it can see, feel, touch the myriad of things it oversees? Indeed, Senators Hawley and Blackburn have introduced a bill to move this and other agencies out of DC and closer to the people they are supposed to serve.
With the advent of communication and transportation technologies, the need to be centrally located for the oft raised issue of “interagency coordination”, is greatly reduced if not eliminated. DC has never seen a recession, housing bubble or other economic calamities the rest of the country has suffered. Why? Because it is immune with perpetual growth of the bureaucracy that keeps people moving in for high paying jobs keeping housing prices increasing. Sheltered from reality, these DC residents become entrenched and fight for the privilege of remaining there through allegiance to the public employees’ union and the politicians that pander to them.
President Trump raised the issue of moving the FBI to Detroit when they were looking to find new space. That effort went nowhere, and I suspect that this one won’t either.
Current Day Publius 