Three years ago, the Legislative Audit Council recommended merging the state Commission for the Blind with another state agency to improve services and reduce costs. The Legislature's failure to do so should be a reminder of how efficiencies continue to be lost by its resistance to restructuring.

The LAC recommended merging the commission with the state Vocational Rehabilitation Department, noting in its 2002 report that the agencies have related goals and that a merger would eliminate duplication and streamline services.

A recent follow-up on that audit showed some legislative interest in the agencies' merger, but not enough actually to reach the goal. That lapse offers an example of the Legislature's inability to get behind broader restructuring reforms, both for state agencies and constitutional offices.

The LAC didn't estimate an actual cost savings for the proposed merger, but it did so for a larger consolidation involving eight health and human services agencies that it recommended in 2003. That merger would have produced savings of $26 million the first year, and improved customer service as well.

Unfortunately, reform legislation failed to pass this year for the health and human services agencies. Nor did a proposal to create a Department of Administration to achieve greater accountability and streamlining get legislative approval.

And the Legislature continues to falter on a proposal to allow voters to decide whether several constitutional officers should be appointed by the governor, and their agencies placed in his Cabinet. That proposal would improve accountability by making the state's chief executive officer, elected statewide, responsible for their operation. Many agencies continue to be governed by appointed boards and commissions, unaccountable to the voters.

Legislators like to talk about the importance of cutting costs and reducing the burden on state taxpayers, yet have failed to advance restructuring proposals that are clearly aimed at those ends. While some legislators appear reluctant to support the governor's reform agenda, it should be emphasized that the reorganization proposals for the Commission for the Blind and for health and human services agencies came from their own Audit Council.

The LAC's remarks on the restructuring of health and human services agencies bear repeating. Noting that none were in the governor's cabinet, the LAC concluded, "There is no central point of accountability for their performance. No executive branch entity has the authority to ensure comprehensive planning and budgeting or that services are provided efficiently."

The LAC's follow-up report on the Commission for the Blind did conclude that agency officials had approved a number of cost-saving and accountability measures recommended in its 2002 audit. There's some comfort in the thought that the bureaucrats are paying attention to ideas for better government, even if many elected members of the Legislature aren't.