I really should have known better. I mean, really–after years of experiencing the excruciating slowness of Vermont’s Office of Professional Regulation, what basis did I have for thinking I would have heard by early this week of a decision that was made at the end of last week?

I’m an optimist by nature, and said as much in my letter to the director of OPR last October 31–a letter which I wrote after I learned that his office had taken no action whatever on a matter that had been sitting there for a year and a half. Yes, a year and a half.

Maybe when I get home today, there will be a letter in the mailbox with the promised decision. Maybe it won’t come anytime soon, in keeping with OPR’s past performance. We’ll see. Lack of timeliness isn’t their only problem, however. They also have trouble performing according to their own published procedures and policies. Granted, pretty much every organization falls down occasionally, drops the ball in some big way. But in the same big ways? Over a very long time period? If you’re interested in details of the kinds of things I’m referring to, you may want to read the letter I wrote to the OPR director back in October, here.

These are some of the reasons we need a State Ombudsman in Vermont. Not only would state bureaucracies have to follow state law and their own rules more than they do now, but with an independent 3rd party looking over their shoulder, they might be motivated to avoid the embarrassment of being seen to operate so sloppily.

Peace.

Deborah Alicen