A Field Guide to Government Whistleblower Retaliation

The scandal over the absolutely
horrible treatment of patients by the Department of Veterans
Affairs (VA) has a
secondary scandal: VA employees who have attempted to blow the
whistle on the agency’s corruption have faced retaliation.

The Washington Post
spent time with the woman who used to be the spokesperson for
the hospital in Phoenix (the one that had been Ground Zero for the
scandal, but problems have been exposed at hospitals across the
country). She is no longer the hospital’s spokesperson. She is now
essentially a living joke about government bureaucracy:

[Paula] Pedene, 56, is the former chief spokeswoman for this VA
hospital. Now, she is living in a bureaucrat’s urban legend. After
complaining to higher-ups about mismanagement at this hospital, she
has been reassigned — indefinitely — to a desk in the basement.

In the Phoenix case, investigators are still trying to determine
whether Pedene was punished because of her earlier complaints. If
she is, that would make her part of a long, ugly tradition in the
federal bureaucracy — workers sent to a cubicle in exile.

In the past, whistleblowers have had their desks moved to break
rooms, broom closets and basements. It’s a clever punishment,
good-government activists say, that exploits a gray area in the
law.

The whole thing can look minor on paper. They moved your
office. So what? But the change is designed to afflict the
striving soul of a federal worker, with a mix of isolation, idle
time and lost prestige.

The Post describes her workday in the basement, which
is exactly what you’d think it is—she’s a second receptionist in a
basement library where the visitors rarely need any help at
all.

The Washington Post attempted to get an explanation
from the VA on why Pedene is being treated the way she was. The hit
a wall, partly because the person responsible for sending Pedene to
the basement has been put on leave because of the big scandal, and
partly because of the typical “no comment on personnel matters”
response that thwarts any journalist trying to figure out what
happens to any human being who works for any government from lowly
garbage collectors, to police officers, to city managers.
 

Read the whole thing
here.