Pomeroy Is Listening

From the Bismark Tribune:

Rep. Earl Pomeroy, D-N.D. [the chairman of the House Social Security Subcommittee], met with local Social Security Administration officials to talk about the future of the program.

Pomeroy’s subcommittee on Social Security is hosting a meeting on the subject this week, and the congressman has held a few such roundtables in North Dakota as preparation, part of what he calls a listening tour. ...

Facing the Social Security Administration are major staffing problems, where the force is decreasing as the pool of claimants is getting larger. Pomeroy said he’s heard from a number of staffers that retirees are not being replaced fast enough to meet customer service demands and that phones at the office are constantly busy because there just aren’t enough people to answer them. ...

He blames the inability to fund more Social Security jobs on cuts from Congress during the Bush administration, but said that an announcement by the Social Security commissioner that the agency would add 900 new jobs can at least partially be attributed to pressure from his committee.

And there is a related story on local television.