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Ohio Division of Wildlife Chief Out.

This isn't corporate America, Joe. This is an agency that's responsible for managing our natural resources for the greater good of the public. It's lunacy that you're totally okay with management decisions being made by political appointees instead of experienced professionals. You're the one who's nuts.
 
So, to be clear......

Zehringer is former head of department of Agriculture.

He continued the previous administration agenda of decimating deer population especially on public land. Massive monetary win for farmers!

DOW loses money as annual tag sales drop for 8 years in a row squeezing their budget.

Chief says we need more money. Director says, "you can't raise NR fees, as they're the only group left that is reliable to execute our mission."

Chief gains political support for it anyway, and gets fired.

New chief is put in place and 7 leadership positions got the axe, but not Tonk.

Of course our good buddy Mike Tonkovich didn't get axed.

Any questions?
 
CritterGitterToo said:
So, to be clear......

Zehringer is former head of department of Agriculture.

He continued the previous administration agenda of decimating deer population especially on public land. Massive monetary win for farmers!

DOW loses money as annual tag sales drop for 8 years in a row squeezing their budget.

Chief says we need more money. Director says, "you can't raise NR fees, as they're the only group left that is reliable to execute our mission."

Chief gains political support for it anyway, and gets fired.

New chief is put in place and 7 leadership positions got the axe, but not Tonk.

Of course our good buddy Mike Tonkovich didn't get axed.

Any questions?
Click to expand...

What's your point? Tonkovich reports to Kohler, who is now gone to Parks.
 
jagermeister said:
This isn't corporate America, Joe. This is an agency that's responsible for managing our natural resources for the greater good of the public. It's lunacy that you're totally okay with management decisions being made by political appointees instead of experienced professionals. You're the one who's nuts.
Click to expand...
Never once have I said I agree with the appointees. Don't put words in my mouth. What I have said is it should not come as a shock to anyone that their asses got fired. I called it a month-and-a-half ago that no matter which way this went their ass was getting fired. I also said that it may lead to leadership changes at the ODNR, AKA zehringer is not immune from the backlash. Depending on how pissy people get, he may get fired just to make it go away. Which make no mistake that is the agenda for all of this hubbub.
 
CritterGitterToo said:
So, to be clear......

Zehringer is former head of department of Agriculture.

He continued the previous administration agenda of decimating deer population especially on public land. Massive monetary win for farmers!

DOW loses money as annual tag sales drop for 8 years in a row squeezing their budget.

Chief says we need more money. Director says, "you can't raise NR fees, as they're the only group left that is reliable to execute our mission."

Chief gains political support for it anyway, and gets fired.

New chief is put in place and 7 leadership positions got the axe, but not Tonk.

Of course our good buddy Mike Tonkovich didn't get axed.

Any questions?
Click to expand...
You're pretty much correct, however it is likely not over. The new leadership appointees will begin to evaluate their direct reports and put people in place they think will make them successful at their job, and will move or get rid of the ones they don't like, come with too much baggage, or were fiercely loyal to their previous boss. Tonk is in no way out of the woods.
 
jagermeister said:
This isn't corporate America, Joe. This is an agency that's responsible for managing our natural resources for the greater good of the public. It's lunacy that you're totally okay with management decisions being made by political appointees instead of experienced professionals. You're the one who's nuts.
Click to expand...

Jackalope said:
You're pretty much correct, however it is likely not over. The new leadership appointees will begin to evaluate their direct reports and put people in place they think will make them successful at their job, and will move or get rid of the ones they don't like, come with too much baggage, or were fiercely loyal to their previous boss. Tonk is in no way out of the woods.
Click to expand...

Having spent the first 10 years of my professional career working in "corporate" America, and the last 18 month in the non-profit world (with strong ties to state and federal government), I believe the intra (and inter)-office politics and power plays are just as bad, if not worse in the public arena than what I experienced in the corporate world. Human nature is human nature regardless of the setting, so I don't think Joe is nuts at all to layout what he has in the quote above, or in his response to your statement above. Corporate, not corporate, private, public, one things remains constant: people. And largely speaking, people suck...
 
People are people. Yes. Joe was making it seem like this sort of thing is normal. In corporate America, it sure is. But for the Division of Wildlife, or any other state or county agency for that matter, it is anything but normal. If it was, they wouldn't have needed to remove civil service protection from those assistant chief positions first. A leadership shakeup is one thing. This was an earthquake.
 
Jackalope said:
You guys are nuts this happens every day in corporate America. And yes you are right it happens at the governor's level also, who then makes appointments, who then come in and in turn make appointments, shit rolls all the way down hill. This might be unprecedented for the Dow however it is not an unprecedented practice, it is very common. What may contribute to it being unprecedented for the Dow is leadership trying to cut their bosses throat.
Click to expand...
Wrong again, they took classified (meaning you can't displace or move/fire with just cause) made them unclassified and shipped them out. That's is absolutely unprecedented on that scale.
 
I'm not educated enough on the specifics of the DOW's past operations to speak intelligently to that aspect. My point simply being collusion, cliques, CYA mentalities, exist in nearly every work environment in America. To see people behave in "unprecedented" ways should largely be "precedented" in 2017.
 
I was able to attend the meeting last night. I left with the impression that the ODNR will stop at nothing to get their hands on DOW money. Anyone that buys a license and tags should be concerned about where their money will eventually be spent.
 
jagermeister said:
People are people. Yes. Joe was making it seem like this sort of thing is normal. In corporate America, it sure is. But for the Division of Wildlife, or any other state or county agency for that matter, it is anything but normal. If it was, they wouldn't have needed to remove civil service protection from those assistant chief positions first. A leadership shakeup is one thing. This was an earthquake.
Click to expand...

Happens all the time in government, Most every election cycle really. You just don't see it because by the time it gets to the lower levels it's masked in things like performance reviews or termination for whatever made up cause.

Loretta lynch an obama liberal was head of the DOJ. She was removed and Jeff Sessions a longtime conservative was put in place.. Do you think Sessions will allow Lynches liberal management chain to remain in place?

Hell no

Attorney General Loretta Lynch replaced by Jeff Sessions.
Deputy attorney general Sally yates was replaced by Rosenstein
Solicitor general Ian Gershengorn replaced by Noel Francisco
Associate attorney general Baer was replaced with Rachel Brand
and on and on, right down down to the bottom of the org chart at the US parole commission that currently sits vacant after a lynch hire was fired.

And each of those people will look at their directs reports, and those direct reports will look at their direct reports, right down to the individual contributor level.
 
What you just described is what is contributing to my current situation. All new leadership in the branch of the bureaucracy I'm employed by. There's a house cleaning going on from top down and it's severely delaying things...
 
Milo said:
Wrong again, they took classified (meaning you can't displace or move/fire with just cause) made them unclassified and shipped them out. That's is absolutely unprecedented on that scale.
Click to expand...

You said "Just cause".. Lol.. Let me tell you about just cause.. There once was a director that a fortune 250 company wanted to fire.. Yet they didn't really have "Just cause" and wanted to back fill his position. So here is what they did. During the next reorg they created an entirely new division and gave it to this guy to head up, had him create an org chart and positions and everything. Really talked him up on this great new opportunity. They back filled his old position internally and went on with the reorg. A month later the reorg was done. The day after they eliminated his new position and walked him out the door.. For every law there is a way around it.. In this case it appears that way was the removal of the civil protection classification.
 
The only way I see a direct comparison to corporate operation is that they want to use the biggest money maker (DOW) to fund the other less profitable portions of the department of natural resources .
 
Public or private, $$$ are going to drive behaviors. Joe is spot on, it is common practice for a leader to surround themselves with "their own" to ensure their vision is executed. I am understanding this hasn't historically been the case/scenario in this situation/public sector nor am I supporting these actions to replace well educated, qualified candidates, but I am by no means shocked.
 
This country is divided from top to bottom. All this proves that.

It seems the biggest fighters for compromise are the ones throwing stones. Everyone will get fucked if this continues.
 
Jackalope said:
You said "Just cause".. Lol.. Let me tell you about just cause.. There once was a director that a fortune 250 company wanted to fire.. Yet they didn't really have "Just cause" and wanted to back fill his position. So here is what they did. During the next reorg they created an entirely new division and gave it to this guy to head up, had him create an org chart and positions and everything. Really talked him up on this great new opportunity. They back filled his old position internally and went on with the reorg. A month later the reorg was done. The day after they eliminated his new position and walked him out the door.. For every law there is a way around it.. In this case it appears that way was the removal of the civil protection classification.
Click to expand...

Honestly my give a fuck is now gone for most of this topic. Good luck
 
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