DC Department of Buildings Staff At Work

Management Ineptitude Revealed at the DC Dept of Buildings, and Freddie Mac

I am sure most (or several) of our public employees are hard working, civic oriented folks.  (Note this does not include our President, Sleepy Joe, who apparently naps 12 hours per day).  However, a story out of the Washington Post today reveals a stellar employee that goes beyond plain, nose to the grind stone work ethic.  She can do the work of THREE public employees!

As it turns out, this is because she was working three jobs, and getting paid for each of them.  Caroline Lian, now fired Deputy Director of the Department of Buildings in Washington DC, got paid plenty;  $175,000.  Apparently, she worked there a couple of days a week.  You can guess she works remotely, because it would be hard for her to fulfill the needs of her other full time job if people could overhear her doing so.   She was fined just $25K, despite arguably stealing $88K/year in unearned salary for several years. 

When not helping out the comically hapless Director, Brian Hanlon, at the Dept of Buildings, she was similary pretending to work full time work at Freddie Mac, (federal government agency).  She maybe put in a few hours? She got paid a reported high six figure salary there.  Presumably also as a remote worker. 

As a reminder, she would be eligible for two pensions from these jobs.  Nice. 

When she is not doing these two jobs, and perhaps getting in daily yoga sessions in at lunch, Ms. Lian is also a member of a Falls Church Virginia’s City Council.  Can’t tell if this position is paid also, my guess is that it is.  So she has three paid gigs. 

Lets ponder the fact that assuming she got a similar amount from Freddie Mac as she used to from the ejits running DOB, that means altogether she gorged on $350,000 plus let’s say 25% in health and pension bennies.  That’s $475K just from TWO jobs.  Maybe another $50K from Falls Church?  Half a million in total pay.  Who knows if she did any actual work at any of them?

I think this justifies the question, is the DC  Department of Buildings overstaffed by 50%?  Where was the Director, Brian Hanlon, while his #2 employee moonlighted at 2 other paid jobs?  How much does he get paid to NOT supervise employees?  I visualize an empty headquarters, with occasional zoom calls.  Employees walking dogs, flying kites, doing Pilates, attending pro Hamas rallies, anything but any actual work, down there.  Check here to read further on the incompetence level at the DOB. 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/02/24/dcra-department-of-buildings-dc-complaints/

Meanwhile, over at Freddie Mac, it appears that she was similarly not supervised by anyone.     The history of fiscal management is shaky at best at Freddie.  Recall that in 2003 the Deadly Freddie was caught cooking the books, overstating profits by $10B.  Combined with Fannie Mae, they produced almost a trillion dollars in loan losses through inept and possibly fraudulent practices.  Now we know there is minimal supervision of senior staff, at best.  So here again, no surprise.

The next time you read about a government agency (excluding the police) which is complaining about adequate staffing levels, remember this blog.  Extremely small violins are available online.