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Governor issues executive order aiming to curb contractor use and keep jobs with state
Summary
The governor said he signed an executive order intended to prevent contractors from supplanting state employees and reaffirmed a goal to reduce the overall number of state employees by the time he leaves office.
The governor said he signed an executive order to prevent a shift from state employees to private contractors and to demonstrate that his administration is not replacing jobs with contracted services.
“When I leave office as governor, we’re gonna have fewer state employees than when I took office in 2019,” he said, describing a long-term goal of a smaller workforce achieved through attrition and efficiency. The governor said the executive order is intended to “prove that’s not true” about claims that his administration is cutting employees but hiring contractors in their place.
He said his policy preference is to hire state employees when they can perform work “better and quicker and more efficiently” than contractors. “If we’re paying a contractor when we can have an employee do it better and quicker and more efficiently, I would absolutely say hire the employee,” he said. The governor also said the current employee count is higher than when he took office, by “probably 3 or 400 people.”
The governor framed the executive order as part of a broader effort to keep budgets flat, use technology and efficiency to reduce headcount over time, and avoid growing government. He said the order will make it easier to show the public that the state is not simply shifting costs to contractors.
