THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, July 8, 1995 TAG: 9507080434
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium: 51 lines
Two training programs for state government managers are being suspended by the Allen administration even though one official considers the programs valuable, if a strain on an already reduced staff.
The fate of the Virginia Executive Institute and the Commonwealth Management Institute will be decided by December, said Charles E. James Sr., director of the Department of Personnel and Training.
James said Thursday that the suspensions had nothing to do with an administration approach to government that critics in both parties perceive as putting conservative ideology ahead of practical managerial experience.
``If a person has good ideology - `good' defined as they agree with this governor - they still have to know how things work,'' he said.
The executive institute is for agency managers while the management institute is for midlevel employees. Gov. George Allen's critics contended that suspending the programs was the latest assault on bureaucracy.
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Hunter B. Andrews, D-Hampton, one of the Republican governor's more outspoken opponents, said the executive institute improves the quality of state employees.
``Quite frankly, this administration needs much more of that because they've replaced so many people,'' Andrews said.
After dismissing most agency heads in 1994, Allen targeted hundreds of senior personnel. A buyout and early-retirement program further depleted the ranks of seasoned employees when more than 5,000 state workers departed.
The executive and management institutes are among three training programs operated by the personnel department. The state's largest agencies also have management training plans.
The institutes bring together staff members from across Virginia government for briefings and workshops on a range of topics, among them leadership, media relations and reorganization.
The executive institute, launched in the 1980s and loosely patterned on a federal program, is held over two weeks in Fredericksburg, Charlottesville or Williamsburg.
Graduates of what may be its final class, which wrapped up before the July 4 holiday weekend, include the superintendent of state police, a deputy attorney general and the second-in-command in the investment office of the Virginia Retirement System. by CNB