Reason Report Winter 2003 • Issue No.

97

Privatizing 850,000 Federal Jobs

In an exciting development
for privatization advocates, the
Bush Administration announced
plans to privatize 850,000
government jobs, almost half of
the federal work force. The
decision is a powerful endorse-
ment of Reason’s decades of
privatization work.
According to the Office of
Management and Budget
(OMB), this has been in the
works since the President’s
Management Agenda was an-
nounced in August 2001. Rea-
son Executive Director Adrian
Moore and Senior Fellow Carl
DeMaio provided research and
strategic guidance in formulat-
ing the Agenda, and are work-
ing closely with OMB to ensure
its smooth implementation.
“We want to provide the best
service for the taxpayer,” said
Angela Styles, federal pro-
curement policy administrator
for OMB. “We think a key tool
for doing that is through pub-
lic-private competition.”
During the past year, Reason
has been providing advice on
the privatization and competi-
tive sourcing initiatives to a
number of federal agencies
including the Department of
the Interior (which received
approval from the Administra-
tion for its “streamlined” job
competition program), Depart-
ment of the Treasury (which
announced a massive out-
Reason Vice President Adrian Moore presents his views on
government outsourcing and competitive contracting at the World
Outsourcing Summit. President Bush has called for the
privatization of 850,000 federal jobs.
sourcing initiative targeting Club that “Reason Foundation
6,000 technology positions), is truly one of the leading
and the Department of Defense voices out there on privatiza-
(where their project covers tion.... They have done a great
214,000 defense jobs—the job of educating the public and
largest privatization effort ever helping agencies to integrate
undertaken by a single federal the President’s initiatives.” n
agency).
Reason has maximized its In This Issue
influence by working closely
Privatization:
with OMB, which will act in an
Something to Sing About,
oversight capacity as the new page 3
initiative is implemented. Jack
Rural/Metro’s Lou Witzeman:
Kalavritinos, OMB’s director
Privatization Pioneer,
of competitive sourcing and page 4
privatization, has come to rely
Debating the Wisdom of
on Reason for intellectual sup-
Attacking Iraq,
port and practical assistance. page 8
Kalavritinos recently told an
audience at the National Press
President’s Letter

Disarming the Anti-gun Lobby

Reason magazine covers winning book Arming America:
current events and presents in- the Origins of a National Gun
depth stories about issues that Culture. The piece was a scath-
are not ing rebuttal of a book that was
featured celebrated as debunking the
by the myth of America’s gun-totin’
main- past. Even before the book
stream appeared, The New York Times
media. As went on record endorsing the
a result, book’s findings and dozens of
Reason is a critics hailed the book as a
powerful victory for the gun control
tool in shaping the opinions and lobby.
ideas of intellectuals, journal- Dr. Malcolm’s masterful
ists, and opinion leaders. critique went to the heart of
The point was brought home Bellesiles’s research, pointing Dr. Joyce Malcolm also wrote
the November 2002 cover story
again recently when I heard an out numerous factual misrepre-
showing how restricting fire-
interesting story that highlights sentations in support of his arms has made England more
the mighty reach of Reason’s claim that early America was crime-ridden than the U.S.
hard-hitting analysis. virtually gun-free. Her article
In January 2001, Reason was one of the first to take Criticism of Bellesiles began
featured a review by Harvard Bellesiles to task for shoddy to snowball until even his own
historian Joyce Lee Malcolm scholarship, and it caused oth- university began to question his
of Michael Bellesiles’s award- ers to sit up and take notice. findings. His excuses were
troubling—he even claimed that
a flood had wiped out his re-
Reason Report
search. In October, he resigned
Chairman of the Board his faculty position.
Harry E. Teasley, Jr.
(You can read Dr. Malcolm’s
Board of Trustees
Thomas E. Beach, Beach Investment Counsel, Inc. • William A. Dunn, Dunn Capital review and other articles on
Management • David Fleming, Latham & Watkins • C. Boyden Gray, Wilmer, Cutler & gun policy online at
Pickering • James D. Jameson • Manuel S. Klausner, Law Offices of Manuel S. Klausner
Reason.com/bi/guns.shtml.)
• David H. Koch, Koch Industries • James Lintott, Sterling Foundation Management,
LLC • Stephen Modzelewski, The Watermark Group • Sarah O’Dowd, Heller Ehrman Reason holds people ac-
White & McAuliffe • Robert W. Poole, Jr., Reason Foundation • Al St. Clair, Procter & countable for their words and
Gamble • Walter E. Williams, George Mason University • Frank Bond (Trustee Emeritus)
actions. Claiming that “the
Reason Foundation
Robert W. Poole, Jr., Founder • David Nott, President • Nick Gillespie, Vice President
flood ate my research” is not a
and Editor-in-Chief, Reason Magazine • Adrian T. Moore, Vice President and Executive valid excuse for poor scholar-
Director, Reason Public Policy Institute ship. For rigorous debate, see
Reason Magazine Founding Editors
the Reason Online debate be-
Manuel S. Klausner, Tibor Machan, Robert W. Poole, Jr.
Reason Report
tween John Lott and Robert
Donald Heath, Editor • Melissa Palmer, Associate Editor • Ray Ng, Designer • Jennifer Ehrlich on Lott’s empirical
Kambara, Layout work on the impact of con-
Published quarterly for supporters of Reason Foundation, 3415 S. Sepulveda Blvd., cealed carry laws. n
Suite 400, Los Angeles, CA 90034-6064 Phone: 310-391-2245, fax: 310-391-4395
—David Nott
Web: Reason.org • Reason.com • RPPI.org • E-mail: contribute@Reason.org
Copyright 2003. Reason Foundation is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) research and educational
institution. All contributions are tax-deductible. Federal tax ID# 95-3298239.

2 Reason Report

Privatization in Uganda: A No-longer Unsung Success
As a result of President
Bush’s call to privatize 850,000
jobs, a lot of media reports have
been written about privatiza-
tion. Those usually don’t make
you want to dance.
Not so with “Today for
Tomorrow (The Privatisation
Song)” a dance-pop ditty by
The Afrigo Band, Uganda’s
most popular musical group.
With a loyal following in Africa
and around the world, Afrigo
has recorded over 200 songs
and was featured on the
soundtrack for the 1992 movie
Mississippi Masala. The band
began making music over 30
years ago and they play their
unique combination of contem-
porary Ugandan pop and tradi-
tional melodic harmonies to
packed houses.
The also have a social con-
science. Over the years, the
band has written pop tunes to
Hit and Run: An Online Smash
Promising “Continuous
News, Views, and Abuse by the
Reason staff,” Reason magazine
introduced Hit and
Run, its first-ever
“blog,” in Decem-
ber.
Blogs, a.k.a.
Web logs, are Web
pages made up of
short, frequently updated posts
that are arranged chronologi-
cally. Reason’s blog includes
topical commentary from staff
writers and comments from
readers who are visiting the site.
Reason.org
educate Ugandans about envi-
ronmental protection, repro-
ductive health, nutrition and
early childhood development,
and voter registration.
“Today for Tomorrow,”
written by James Wasula, is a
testament to the success of
Uganda’s fledgling privatization
efforts. “You know that music is
a very powerful means of infor-
mation dissemination,” Wasula
told Reason Report.
He says he wrote the song to
Glenn Reynolds of
InstaPundit.com (who will be
speaking about blogging at
Reason Weekend in March)
invited readers of his very
popular blog to visit Hit and
Run to “(l)earn why David
Geffen is a loser, why Kurt
Vonnegut is an idiot, and why
News
combat the initial skepticism
surrounding privatization in
Uganda. “Ugandans were too
used to para-statal organiza-
tions to imagine the alterna-
tive,” he said. “Personally, I
was for privatization, having
realized how unprofitably
para-statal organizations were
being run by political appoin-
tees. Service delivery and
customer relations were ex-
tremely poor, and nepotism
was the order of the day.”
Since Uganda began imple-
menting privatization in 1992,
the quality and quantity of
production in Uganda has
improved, notes Wasula. He
cites courteous and efficient
service delivery as well as
equal job opportunity and a
wider variety of goods and
services as some of the posi-
tive benefits of the change. n
H.L. Mencken was a libertar-
ian, among many other things.
The Wall Street Journal’s
OpinionJournal
hailed Hit and
Run as “lively
and interest-
ing” and Slate
commented
that the site
“already has some juicy tidbits
that I haven’t seen anywhere
else.”
Visit Hit and Run at
Reason.com/hitandrun/. n
3
News

Responding to Fires
by Robert W. Poole, Jr.
I first met Louis A. Witzeman in 1971, seven fighting services at hourly rates that illustrated
years before the creation of Reason Foundation. what a good deal it was to be a subscriber.
The consulting firm for which I worked had sent By the time I toured Rural/Metro in 1971,
me to Phoenix on a project involving public Scottsdale had long since incorporated as a city.
safety communications. While I was in town for Instead of setting up its own fire department, its
a week, I could not resist making contact with officials decided to contract with Rural/Metro to
the fire chief of neighboring Scottsdale. Why? protect the whole city. The company continued
Because he was the founder and president of a the subscription concept in rural areas across
for-profit fire-protection company, Rural/Metro Arizona (and later in several other states). This
Corporation. I’d read about this unique example private model of fire protection had also become
of private enterprise the object of much
providing a public outside attention—
service, and I wanted from policy research-
to see it for myself. ers who documented
To my pleasant the lower cost of fire
surprise, Lou service in Scottsdale
Witzeman responded compared with con-
positively to my phone ventional fire service
call from out of the in comparable sub-
blue. The next day I urbs, and from
got a guided tour of firefighters unions
the fire station, and who launched an
learned the capsule endless propaganda
history of his starting Louis A. Witzeman, founder of for-profit fire campaign against the
the company from protection company, Rural/Metro Corporation concept and the com-
scratch in 1948. pany.
As a journalist recently relocated to Arizona In 1976 my company landed a small contract
from the Midwest, young Witzeman was dis- to do a feasibility study for a suburb of Santa
mayed to find there was no fire service in the Barbara that was thinking of providing its own
unincorporated suburb called Scottsdale. His fire protection and wanted to learn if contract
first effort to organize a quasi-volunteer depart- service, à la Scottsdale, would be feasible. That
ment, by going door to door asking neighbors to led me to spend several days at Rural/Metro
chip in for a used fire truck, met with failure. headquarters, including responding with Chief
Undaunted, he took a leaf from the auto club Witzeman to a gas station fire, seeing his crews
model and invented subscription fire service. in action.
Those who paid an annual membership fee In addition to doing the study, I also wrote a
would get guaranteed response to fires and other cover story about private fire service and why it
emergencies; those who did not could take their worked better for Reason magazine’s May 1976
chances. It worked, and after the business was issue. Two years later, that story found its way to
up and running, two factors reinforced the legiti- a CBS “60 Minutes” producer, who contacted
macy of the concept. First, insurance companies me for details and ended up doing a great piece
offered lower rates to subscribers than non- on the program about Rural/Metro. Lou was
subscribers, which offset the cost of the annual very upset when I called to tell him that “60
fee in most cases. Second, the state agreed that Minutes” wanted to do a story about them. Hav-
Rural/Metro could offer non-subscribers fire- ing warded off many union attacks over the
4 Reason Report

years, he was worried about attack journalism,
especially when he learned that Mike Wallace
would be doing the story. But it turned out to be
a powerful endorsement of the company’s innova-
tive approach, and Lou used it in company mar-
keting for many years.
In the course of these adventures, Lou and I
became friends. He subscribed to Reason, and
took a modest interest in the fledgling Libertarian
Party in Arizona. Once Reason Foundation was
up and running, he became one of our most faith-
ful supporters. In addition to one or more annual
contributions, he set up speaking engagements
for me and introduced me to other potential
supporters in Arizona. In later years, some of
those who’d helped finance Rural/Metro, includ-
ing Jim Ludke, became Reason supporters.
Lou sold the company to his employees in
1978, by way of an employee stock ownership
plan, and continued to serve as CEO and chair-
man of the board until his retirment in 1980.
Those later years were a time of massive growth,
as Rural/Metro became a major national player in
the emergency ambulance/paramedic business,
Union Snubs Reason Survey
The International Association of Fire Fighters
(IAFF), a labor union of firefighters throughout
the U.S. and Canada, is blocking Reason’s efforts
to conduct an efficiency and quality analysis of
emergency medical service
(EMS) delivery in 200 major
urban areas.
Some performance-related
data suggests that private EMS
offers better quality and more
efficient service than does EMS
provided by fire departments.
Reason set out to analyze the
performance of each delivery
method and promote best prac-
tices across the country.
The Reason survey requested data on provider
type, area covered, utilization rates and cost
information. In a letter to its membership, the
IAFF asks members to ignore the survey and
accuses Reason of being a “shadow promoter of
Reason.org
News
eventually emerging as the second largest pri-
vate provider. The fire business grew steadily,
too, but at nothing like the torrid pace of the
ambulance side, which eventually became the
dominant part of the business. But that led to
financial difficulties by the late 1990s, after the
company went public, as much tighter Medicare
and Medicaid reimbursement policies put a
serious squeeze on the ambulance industry. The
once unsexy fire business became a welcome
source of stability in those troubled years.
Reason Foundation’s worldwide reputation in
privatization owes much to my early visit to Lou
Witzeman’s innovative company. It was seeing in
the flesh how dramatically different fire protec-
tion could be when done by a for-profit com-
pany that convinced me of the importance of
privatization of public services. And that led
directly to the development of Reason
Foundation’s first ongoing area of public policy
work. Everyone in the privatization field is in
Lou Witzeman’s debt. n
Robert W. Poole, Jr. is Founder of Reason Founda-
tion and Director of Transportation Studies.
privatization of public services” and notes that
our goal is to support the widespread privatiza-
tion of EMS.
Reason takes seriously any attempt by gov-
ernment to expand into
privately provided services.
We believe that services
ought to be provided in
competitive private markets,
where choice will drive
performance, accountability,
innovation, and efficiency.
Reason’s request for
transparency and account-
ability from both fire de-
partments and private pro-
viders is an opportunity for objective analysis of
EMS data. By refusing to participate in the
survey, the IAFF showed that it does not have
the confidence to compete with private compa-
nies on the basis of performance. n
5
News

Reason Weekend 2003

A Veritable Feast of Good Ideas
Supporters of Reason have a
hunger for new ideas. Each
year our major supporters,
Reason staff, and exciting guest
speakers feast on great food and
better ideas at Reason Weekend.
Reason Weekend 2003 will
be held March 13-16 at San
Diego’s Hotel del Coronado.
This beautiful Victorian
hotel, just across the bay from
downtown and minutes from
the airport, will be the scene of
stimulating presentations, great
meals, and ample time to talk
with other people who share a
great love of liberty. Rebecca Walter Dunn and Nobel Laureate Norman Borlaug
share a laugh in San Antonio at Reason Weekend 2002
This year Reason Weekend
features dinners with Virginia prove our society.” Reason
Reason Weekend Schedule
Postrel and Catherine Crier, Torchbearer Society member
and a hilarious lunchtime pre- Dwight Filley enjoyed the Thursday, March 13
sentation from Penn Jillette. “very convivial group.” Opening Reception and Dinner
In 2002 Bob Collins, presi- All Reason Torchbearers are
dent of the B&E Collins Foun- encouraged to register today! Friday, March 14
dation, praised the “excellent Call Donald Heath at 310-391- Nick Gillespie, My Way X3:
focus on positive steps to im- 2245 for details. n Popular Culture and the Market for
Identity
Tom Bell and Eugene Volokh,
Intellectual Property in Cyberspace
Gregory Stock, Cloning, Biotech,
and Human Future
Penn Jillette
Virginia Postrel, Esthetics in a
Market Economy

Saturday, March 15
Lisa Snell, Education Reform
Glenn Reynolds, Blogging
Michael De Alessi, Private Con-
servation
Charles Paul Freund, Commer-
cial Culture and Islam
Michael Shermer, Why People
Believe Weird Things
Catherine Crier, The Trouble
With Lawyers
Senior Editor Jacob Sullum counters the new religious campaign
against SUVs by making the case for choice on CNN
6 Reason Report
 Impact

Impact Highlights Impact Summary

October 1, 2001 - September 30, 2002
■ On Sept. 5, Reason Director of Transportation
Articles Citing Reason Experts .................. 1,656
Studies Robert Poole released a report urging
the federal government to expand the number of Total Audience (based on
airports that could privatize airport security circulation of outside articles) .......... 274 million
services. House Aviation Subcommittee Chair- Media Appearances ................................... 431
man John Mica, Senate Transportation Appro-
priations Ranking Republican Richard Shelby, Speaking Engagements .............................. 175
and Senate Republican Policy Committee Chair- Reason Circulation ................................. 58,544
man Larry Craig endorsed the report and its
findings. Senator Craig would go on to propose
an amendment to the Homeland Security Bill to Reason Foundation Online Growth
implement Reason’s recommendations.
2,000,000
■ On Nov. 14, USA Today used Reason’s baggage
screening study to help illustrate problems with
the country’s airport security plan. Robert
Page Impressions
Poole also appeared on several radio stations,
1,000,000
including Washington D.C.’s WAVA, to discuss
airport security and baggage screening.
Unique Users
■ On Dec. 8, Reason Editor-in-Chief Nick
Gillespie appeared on Fox News Channel’s “From
0
the Heartland” to discuss immigration policies. In Jan 00 Jul 00 Jan 01 Jul 01 Jan 02 Jul 02 Nov 02

September, Nick and Senior Editor Jacob Sullum

made a number of radio appearances to discuss the
anniversary of September 11 terrorist attacks and
the erosion of privacy and civil liberties.
■ On Nov. 12, Jacob Sullum appeared on Fox
News Channel’s “The O’Reilly Factor” and sev-
eral radio shows to talk about Megan’s Laws. On
Nov. 20, Sullum argued for vehicle choice and the
right to drive SUVs on CNN’s “TalkBack Live.”
On Sept. 25, Sullum debated hotel pornography
on CNN’s “American Morning with Paula Zahn.”
■ On Nov. 26, Brian Doherty appeared on Fox
News Channel’s “The Big Story” to discuss the
Libertarian Party’s role in elections.
■ On Nov. 21, Reason Vice President Adrian
Moore appeared on National Public Radio’s “On
Point” to discuss President Bush’s initiative to
privatize 850,000 federal government jobs. On
Oct. 3, Adrian appeared on National Public
Radio’s “The Tavis Smiley Show” to support local
attempts to privatize government services.
■ On Sept. 24, Reason Contributing Editor Cathy
Young talked about defense lawyers on Bill
O’Reilly’s radio show, “The Radio Factor.”
Reason.org
Recent Policy Publications
Standard Market Design in Wholesale Electric-
ity Markets: Can FERC’s proposed structure
adapt to the unknown? (Policy Study 301) by
Lynne Kiesling and Brian Mannix, Novem-
ber 2002, RPPI.org/ps301.pdf
Creating a Performance-based Electronic Gov-
ernment by Carl DeMaio, October 2002,
RPPI.org/egovernmentreport.pdf
The Salinas Utility Users Tax: Necessary Rev-
enue Source or Government Waste? (Policy
Study 300) by Geoffrey Segal and Adam
Summers, October 2002, RPPI.org/
ps300.pdf
Designing a Performance-based Competitive
Sourcing Process for the Federal Government
(Policy Study 299) by Adrian Moore, Carl
DeMaio, and Vincent Badolato, October
2002, RPPI.org/ps299.pdf
7
News
War with Iraq: It’s Debatable
Reason Online (Reason.com)
provides a real-time forum to
discuss vital questions affecting
our society. As the Bush Ad-
ministration contemplates
going to war with Iraq, Reason
held an online debate between
Ohio State University Professor
John Mueller and Reason Con-
tributing Editor and Cato Insti-
tute Senior Fellow Brink
Lindsey.
During the five-day ex-
change, the combatants debated
the ethical dilemmas of a for-
eign policy based on preemptive
action and defensive interven-
tion.
Lindsey pointed out that
hostile regimes bent on mass
destruction are an ongoing
threat to global security, and
that Iraq’s history of abetting
terrorism justifies military
Reason Foundation
3415 S. Sepulveda Blvd., Suite 400
Los Angeles, CA 90034-6064
action against the current re-
gime. Mueller disagreed, con-
tending that the deterrent of
overwhelming retaliatory force
is enough to keep an Iraqi
attack in check and that the
consequences of an attack
against Saddam Hussein
would have only negligible
effects on the War on Terror.
The debate prompted an
international barrage of reader
letters to Reason Online, most
attacking Lindsey’s hawkish
stance. By contrast, Virginia
high school teacher Kraig S.
Hoover forwarded comments
from his honors political sci-
ence class that showed a strong
predilection for war.
The debate can be read
online at Reason.com/
IraqDebate.shtml and in the
January 2003 issue of Reason.
In a second online debate,
sponsored in November by
Tech Central Station, Reason
Editor-in-Chief Nick Gillespie
locked horns with National
Review’s Jonah Goldberg on
Milton Friedman’s proposition
that “war is often the enemy of
freedom.”
While Goldberg contended
that war can sometimes in-
crease freedom, Gillespie ar-
gued that Iraq could be effec-
tively contained by other
means, that the USA PA-
TRIOT Act and other re-
sponses to the 9/11 attack are
overly broad, and that war
historically has sanctioned an
increase in state power.
A link to the Tech Central
Station debate can be found at
Reason.com/War.shtml.n
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