Recently, there has been a lot of reference in the media to state employees who are “whistleblowers.” The Texas Whistleblower Act protects public employees who make good faith reports of violations of law by their employer to an appropriate law enforcement authority. An employer may not suspend or terminate the employment of, or take other adverse personnel action against, a public employee who makes a report under the Act. More generally, a whistleblower is someone who reports waste, fraud, abuse, corruption, or dangers to public health and safety to someone who is in the position to rectify the wrongdoing.
This summer, there have been at least three instances of Texas state employees “blowing the whistle” about practices within their agencies that are causing suffering, and in some cases death, of members of the public.
In June, a child protective services worker wrote to state officials that the Texas foster care system is releasing teens out of foster care who have profound disabilities and cannot take care of themselves.
In July, a DPS trooper reported that law enforcement officials are receiving orders to mistreat migrants crossing at the Texas-Mexico border.
And this week, whistleblowers at the Texas Health and Human Services Commission sent a third letter to state officials, including the governor, regarding catastrophic failures and backlogs in the state’s Medicaid eligibility system.
Texas voters should be concerned that employees at multiple state agencies are alleging major policy implementation failures. State employees often are easy targets for complaints, criticism, and abuse when members of the public have problems, but folks who work in state agencies are public servants who often work long hours for little pay out of a sense of responsibility. They are proud of their ability to help people, and distressed when they can’t do their best work—whether it’s because of lack of resources, bureaucratic barriers, or bad policy.
State policymakers bear the ultimate responsibility when state agencies fail to deliver on their missions. Legislators set agency budgets and set the policy framework for agency operations. The governor appoints many agency leaders, and has implicit control over every management layer of every agency.