Bureaucrat power

Although President-elect Donald Trump is appointing heads of federal agencies who are either neophytes or admitted opponents of the agencies, I hope that the agencies are staffed by civil servants dedicated to the mission of their agency.

I hope that those who work at the Environmental Protection Agency are dedicated to a healthy and sustainable world; that those who work at the Department of the Interior are dedicated to preservation of pristine public lands; that those who work at HUD are dedicated to creation of affordable housing and so forth.

Therefore, unless the Republican-led Congress decides to not fund the agencies, which is a possibility, those bureaucrats will provide restraint on the attempted destruction of their bailiwick by incompetent or antipathetic new heads.

I am hopeful they will resist destruction of these agencies’ worthwhile missions.

This story was originally published December 24, 2016 at 2:00 PM with the headline "Bureaucrat power."