Posted on 12/02/2010 7:57:43 AM PST by Second Amendment First
Election losers, welcome to Office Space.
Some of the most senior and respected members of Congress are among the dozens of outgoing lawmakers whose offices have been crammed into tiny basement cubicles as their old offices are emptied and refurbished.
And while nobody seems to be throwing fits about missing red Swingline staplers, the basement bullpen is quite a comedown for some of the most powerful members of Congress, who virtually overnight went from comfortable congressional veterans to homeless on the Hill.
Rep. James Oberstar (D-Minn.), the transportation committee chairman who championed legislation to fix America’s crowded highways, faces an overcrowding issue of his own, a drastic change from the royal blue carpet, piles of crisp legislative papers and transportation memorabilia that once filled his cheery Rayburn office.
Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.), an outspoken liberal firebrand who raised at least $5.1 million this election cycle, will be squatting in other members’ offices or an open committee room until the lame-duck session ends, his press secretary said.
Rep. Earl Pomeroy (D-N.D.), who was chairman of the critical Social Security subcommittee of Ways and Means, now holds meetings in the Longworth Cafeteria.
“Yesterday was the first time in 18 years I didn’t have a home on the Hill,” he told POLITICO. “It was an odd feeling.”
Even without their offices, staffs or favorite chairs, members are still expected to show up for votes and hearings, and to conduct other legislative activities during the lame-duck session that has stretched past this week’s deadline for outgoing lawmakers to vacate their offices.
In an act of sympathy, Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) offered Pomeroy space in his offices to hold meetings with constituents. But Pomeroy said he thinks he’ll be able to take care of those meetings in public areas.
“I spend a lot of time in Longworth Cafeteria,” Pomeroy said.
“Bittersweet,” Oberstar calls the experience. “As files, memos and mementos are sorted, boxed or discarded, you have an opportunity to look back and evaluate things you’ve accomplished.”
“Anxious,” was the sentiment of Oberstar press secretary John Schadl, who sent out his final SOS e-mail to reporters on Tuesday, just before computer officials came to seize his hard drive.
“In a few hours, the House administrative staff will take my laptop and wipe the hard drive,” he wrote to reporters, warning that further communications would be “tricky” to keep up. “Starting tomorrow, we will be given a cubicle in the basement with a single computer and a phone.”
“I wasn’t counting on this,” Schadl told POLITICO as he maneuvered through stacks of boxes and past computer technicians busy wiping the rest of the staff’s computers.
Schadl’s new space in the staff bullpen is so small, he’s even packed up his favorite desktop decoration — a half-brick from the streets of Duluth, Minn., a memento that he’s displayed on his desk for decades.
Most staffers and members are trying to keep their spirits up, aides said, even as the halls of Rayburn yesterday were filled with the final moving boxes.
“We had one of the best offices in Cannon,” Tim Moore, chief of staff to Rep. Jim Marshall (D-Ga.), said. “It was right across the hallway from the refrigerators.”
Until the 111th Congress ends next month, most members will work out of the Outgoing Member Center, while their aides work out of the Member Support Center.
The spaces might be small, but they are an upgrade from previous years.
In other years, members were provided with a temporary work space, but staffers were left to their own devices, often crowding House cafeterias, nearby coffee shops or working from home.
Because the lame-duck session puts tax cuts and a massive food safety bill on Congress’s to-do list, staying on the Hill is more necessary, aides said.
But reviews of the new space have been mixed.
“They only give us one desk, phone [and] computer for the whole office,” said Abigail Gardner, spokeswoman for Rep. Dan Maffei (D-N.Y.).
“A lot of work still needs to be done, and there’s no room to do it,” Moore said.
“It’s really a deluxe hotel business center,” said a Democratic aide close to the House Administration Committee, which was responsible for organizing the two basement spaces. “We’ve heard no complaints.”
The space yields every basic amenity needed for a staffer to survive the lame duck — except coffee. Each cubicle can accommodate up to two aides and is complete with a desktop computer, printer, phone, fax and copier.
Besides the space, the only other noticeable difference with their former digs is the noise, said some aides, many of whom are used to working in small offices with fewer than a dozen co-workers.
“Hang on, we’ve been moved to the basement, and I can’t hear you,” one House receptionist said, trying to speak over background noise.
“The traffic in there ebbs and flows, especially around votes,” said the Democratic staffer close to the committee. “But it’s been well received. We still have a number of people who are also working out of apartments or spending more time in their committee offices, if they have them. Overall, we’re making it work the best we can.”
Grayson’s spokesman, Todd Jurkowski, is counting his blessings to be working out of the lawmaker’s Florida office.
“I will not be as adversely affected,” he said. “We still have about five people on staff in D.C., but I would not expect all of them to be down [in the basement] at the same time.”
As members adjust to their new cubicle surroundings, the sentiment to serve until the end of the term — even without the creature comforts lawmakers are used to — remains strong.
“While my service to northeast Minnesota may be coming to an end, my commitment to serve is not diminishing,” Oberstar said. “The only thing I’ve ruled out is lobbying Congress.”
Sorry Steny, I'm having a hard time feeling sorry for the SoBs.
I do not feel sorry for them. Not even a little bit.
I can tell you where I’d like Pelosi-wench and Dingy Harry...in the working hole of the small wooden building with a moon cutout of the door of my grandparent’s farm.
Oh, with me sitting on the working hole - about to do some work.
I come to a little cubicle every day to earn money to pay my taxes to pay for your friggin’ bloated government, Steny. Get over it!
What a heart-strings moment.....*gag*!
They should be treated like any other fired employee: after losing an election, they’re escorted by security to their office and given fifteen minutes to pack their belongings in a box. Instead we give them two months to loot the treasury before walking out with the silver.
......just karma workin’ as it should.
What the he$$ is this "wiping the rest of the staff's computers" excrement?
Do they also get to shred all the evidence that's on paper?
LOL!
Good. I hope they all have to share the same Swingline.
t.s.
When I was a teenager someone said that to me in response to a complaint I had made.
I didn’t know what it meant so I asked them. They looked at me like I was the dumbest person in the word and said, tough shoveling.
I believed that’s what it meant for years.
ROTFLMAO Thanks for starting my day @ Free Republic with a hearty har-har! What is good for their constituents is good for them.
Americans put you into those fine offices...and because you blatantly went against the will of the people...you were evicted!!! We took the trash out on Nov. 2nd.
What a coincidence...the people don't like what you pampered SOB's are doing to the country. Lots of those poeple would probably be happy to have a job; even if crammed into a cubicle with others...
James Oberstar (AKA Jimmy Bikeshorts) -King of MN Pork:
http://www.cagw.org/reports/pig-book/2010/pork-database.html
District 1: Tim Walz (DFL)
13 earmarks worth $9.7 million
Lowlight: $200,000 for soybean genomics
District 2: John Kline (GOP)
NONE
District 3: Erik Paulsen (GOP)
9 earmarks worth $7.5 million
Lowlight: The fact that Paulsen would seek earmarks at all
District 4: Betty McCollum (DFL)
14 earmarks worth $8.7 million
Lowlight: $200,000 for a neighborhood development center
District 5: Keith Ellison (DFL)
18 earmarks worth $23 million
Lowlight: $150,000 to refurbish the Coe Mansion (whatever that is)
District 6: Michele Bachmann (GOP)
NONE
District 7: Collin Peterson (DFL)
10 earmarks worth $13.7 million
Lowlight: $550,000 for the Center for Rural Entrepreneurial Studies.
Aren’t entrepreneurs folks who create wealth WITHOUT government help?
District 8: Jimmy Bikeshorts Oberstar (DFL)
33 earmarks worth over $72 million
Lowlight: Oberstar’s blatant disregard for America’s future as evidenced by his relentless efforts to waste billions on his pet pork projects. This guy had no shame.
Where is Nancy Pelosi working? I’d like to see her out in the street, just above an enormous sink hole that’s about to happen.
It would cut down on both the congestion and noise.
Better yet, shut down half of the EPA (or any other useless department of your choosing) and move the departees over there.
You should have been 'term-limited' out of office about 12 years ago...
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