After Jernigan had been in Iowa for only two weeks, he wrote a detailed letter to Governor Herschel Loveless outlining the deplorable conditions he had found in the agency upon his arrival. He listed countless critical needs of the agency, and then he finished his letter by saying: "The present director should be given a reasonable (but only a reasonable) time in which to show results. If he does not show results, he should be fired. The present director would not be willing that it should be any other way."