May 14, 2007 By Paul Sunyak 4 min read

Talk about doling out some unvarnished truth. Angela M. Zimmerlink hit the nail so squarely on the head at a Monday night candidate forum that it’s a wonder the metal projectile didn’t travel downward through the proverbial floor and wind up in China. When asked what could be done to address a lack of work ethic and motivation among certain denizens of Fayette County, Zimmerlink, who’s completing her first term as commissioner and is seeking a second, laid out a pretty good plan to motivate people to work: Cut them off from the perpetual social safety net.

The Zimmerlink solution: If you don’t show up for work, you’re fired. And – and this is the kicker that no one else has the guts to say, let alone implement – if you get fired, you don’t have a boatload of welfare programs to fall back on.

Sounds like a pretty good way to make sure people are: 1. Motivated to work; 2. Motivated to not get fired; and 3. Blocked from playing the welfare system like a finely tuned Stradivarius. We all know that latter happens far more often than it should.

Zimmerlink’s tonic is one that few politicians in “poor” Fayette County, where the social service industry has spent decades and millions in tax dollars trying to solve the problem, would dare mix up, let alone urge someone to drink. But it may well be an elixir whose time has come.

I’ll agree that there was a time, maybe even as late as the 1960s, when people just didn’t have the opportunity to better themselves. It many cases, poverty was intractable, something that could be very difficult to escape because of one’s circumstance.

But I firmly believe that today, if someone wants to make something of himself or herself, all things are possible. You can get to and through college – if you want to badly enough. But to do that, you’ve got to keep your grades up (and that usually means just pay attention) in high school, and before that, junior high, and before that, elementary school. The education is free; why not take advantage of it?

The same thing goes for trade schools or vocational training. You can get there from any destination on the social ladder, but only if you’re willing to apply yourself. Hard work usually does pay off in the end.

Zimmerlink is also correct in noting that work ethic begins in the home. It’s not something that can be effectively taught in schools. Especially to students who aren’t much concerned about their classroom performance in the first place. No amount of government spending will ever compensate for a home in which education and hard work are valued, are instilled in children at an early age, and are consistently reinforced.

Today, most people’s problems are usually of their own making. They choose to drink to excess; they become an alcoholic. They choose to eat too much; they become obese and suffer those related health problems. They choose to sell drugs; they end up a junkie or in prison, or both. And, yes, they do choose to have children out of wedlock (sometimes several), then they look to government assistance to foot the bill for all manner of life’s necessities, including ever-expensive health care.

Here’s another truth to add to the Zimmerlink cocktail: In Fayette County, there’s never a shortage of agencies willing to help people out, no matter how irresponsible they’ve been. For example, I once covered a meeting concerning the need for assisted housing. An official from a public housing agency talked about how hard it had been for them to toss out troublemakers. An official from a private but government subsidized housing complex said they’d gotten some of those tenants, who behaved the same way until they finally got rid of them.

Then an official from a social service agency bemoaned its need to get more government money to assist “the homeless,” which would include those with the aforementioned two strikes against them.

Does that make any sense?

Paul Sunyak is editorial page editor of the Herald-Standard. He can be reached at 724-439-7577 or psunyak@heraldstandard.com