Relocating Government

In the New York Times this morning, former IRS commissioner and top Bush administration management official Mark Everson endorses an idea that's been kicking around for awhile now: Move the headquarters of a bunch of federal agencies out of Washington to the hinterlands.

"The concentration of top-level civil servants in Washington poses an undue risk in this age of terrorism," Everson says. In addition, he argues, "the high cost of living in and near the District of Columbia chases away talent."

The State, Treasury, Justice and Defense departments could stay in D.C., Everson argues. But the headquarters of large agencies underneath them, such as the IRS and the Drug Enforcement Agency, could go to the hinterlands -- along with whole departments such as Veterans Affairs and Homeland Security that "are more involved in operating government than in making policy." All of this, he says, would "limit the undue influence of Washington."

Everson even renews his suggestion that the IRS move to New Orleans to spur the city's revitalization. Given recent meteorological trends, that would require planning for the wholesale shutdown of the agency and temporary relocation of its employees on a fairly regular basis.

If we were starting to build a government from scratch, I guess it would make sense not to put all of it in one place. But now that much of it is in Washington, it's hard to justify the enormous expense and disruption involved in uprooting giant agencies like the IRS and plopping them somewhere else. Just to cite one problem, already stressed human resources offices are having enough trouble keeping up with changes in the demographics of the federal workforce without having to worry about shifting thousands of jobs from one city to another.

Besides, I don't think having headquarters operations here makes government as centralized as Everson seems to think it is. There already are sizeable regional federal offices throughout the country, and operational agencies like the IRS and the VA draw on talent from every region to staff far-flung operations.