Is almost impossible as the WSJ notes today on it's opinion page. No matter how steep the failure just try to kill it and get accused of all sorts of things. This parallels the HeadStart fiasco we have been paying for for decades and the governments own extensive follow-ups show no educational advantage after the first two years of elementary school, you cannot tell those who attended HeadStart programs from those who did not. But dare try to eliminate HeadStart and be called anti-child and racist. To Kill a Federal Program Job Corps lives on, despite poor results and unsafe campuses. ....But the $1.7-billion-a-year program has repeatedly failed those it’s supposed to serve. Graduates often end up in low-skill, low-wage jobs where their training is irrelevant, and the Department of Labor’s inspector general has repeatedly discovered that Job Corps’ statistics on student performance and job placement are inaccurate. The IG is investigating what it says are numerous tips “alleging cheating in Job Corps high school programs, such as center staff regrading exams or taking exams on behalf of students to ensure passing scores.” .... Public records reveal more disturbing problems on at least two of the nine Job Corps campuses. Since 2015 law enforcement received at least 54 calls to 911 from the Fort Simcoe center in Washington, and at least 63 from the Anaconda center in Montana. ... You’d think all of this would be reason enough to shut down more centers. But if the Administration had proceeded as planned, some 1,065 Forest Service employees might have lost their jobs. Commence the lobbying. Randy Erwin, their union president, slammed the Administration for “a coordinated attack on the most vulnerable populations in this country: Rural and urban low-income young people hoping to succeed in life.” On June 5 a bipartisan group of 51 lawmakers signed a letter expressing “strong opposition” to closing the centers. They warned that it was "precisely the wrong time” to cut the centers “after a difficult year of natural disasters and with hurricane and wildfire season quickly approaching.” But fewer than 150 of the 30,000 students served by the Forest Service Job Corps centers train to fight fires. Others sometimes support disaster-response efforts, but the central mission of Jobs Corps is to launch students toward steadier work. https://www.wsj.com/articles/to-kill-a-federal-program-11563138229 We wonder why the federal budget is so bloated, how many other such government programs only succeed at giving useless make work jobs to government employees and NOT accomplish their goals.
