If you read this blog for more than five minutes, you learn I have been somewhat unsparing in expressing my concerns about the management of the Oregon Public Employees Retirement System. I want to assure my readers that nothing I say on this topic should be viewed as a criticism of those who choose to make their careers in public employment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Joyce and I have many dear friends and acquaintances in Eugene and elsewhere who have been public workers. Please know we have the deepest admiration and respect for them and everyone like them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Going back as long as I can remember, I never felt our government at any level was bad or evil. I grew up in the 50\u2019s and early 60\u2019s, and I believe my view of government was shared pretty widely back then.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Then, as we passed through the 60\u2019s and 70\u2019s, this changed dramatically, not without justification. Those were times of major upheavals in our society, and, as we know, large numbers of Americans came to distrust, even hate, their own government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This distrust was institutionalized if not further fomented with the election of Ronald Reagan. His message that \u201cgovernment is the problem\u201d took strong root and persists to this day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I still don\u2019t buy it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Our public workers are people who show up every day, without fanfare, often without the compensation available in the private sector, to teach our kids, keep us safe and healthy, provide our electricity and water, keep us moving, and stand ready to respond to any emergency. Their contributions have always been vital to our nation, but over the course of this pandemic, they have distinguished themselves as heroes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I could cite many events where we all thanked God there was a public employee on the other end of the line. But I want to share a story about one person in particular whose name most of us would not recognize. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is the story of public worker Pat Harten, a regular person like you and me, doing his job as he did every day, when he was confronted with an extraordinary situation. Pat Harten was the air traffic controller at La Guardia airport in New York who received the mayday call from Sully Sullenberger on January 15, 2009.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What follows is a 13-minute interview with Pat Harten on the tenth anniversary of this event. His description of the event is riveting enough, to be sure, but that\u2019s not the sole reason I am sharing this. Be sure to listen to the last part starting at about 8:45 into the interview. That part speaks volumes about the goodness in us as Americans, something we don\u2019t seem to hear enough of anymore. God bless him and all our public workers.
If you\u2019re interested in a little more to this story, here\u2019s\u00a0an article<\/a>\u00a0about Pat when he ran the New York marathon in 2018.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n