The headline in the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, May 11, 2006, "Thieves flush out park toilet valves" revealed that more than 100 valves have been stolen from 28 parks. This will cost taxpayers more than $10,000, according to city officials.

"And, because they cannot replace all the valves quickly, out of commission, restrooms will inconvenience visitors," said the article.

All of this is absolutely unnecessary make work.

Why?

Because the city should not be operating the parks.

The city should be responsible for seeing that parks are operating correctly and assuring delivery of good, clean effective service to customers. But it should not be in the business of operating the parks.

What do I mean? Just this: The city should contract out the service and the contract should include a requirement for full effective maintenance. In that case, the contractor would be responsible for loss of the valves and the prompt replacement of same. But, if this was a contracted function with a good strict contract, there would have been just a few thefts before the contractor found a way to stop them. Further, the valves would have been quickly replaced and customers would not have been inconvenienced.

The government cannot effectively operate and supervise a function at the same time. The operator cannot be the inspector. The city must be the enforcer. It cannot enforce its own work-period. That never works.

To illustrate my point, can you imagine going to Disneyland and being told that valves had been stolen from restrooms the night before and that there were no operating restrooms. Of coarse not. If such thefts had happened, the replacements would have been in place before the park opened.

If we want good service and limited liability in government functions, the contracting out option is essential. Otherwise, expect more headlines in newspapers-and more unexpected taxpayers costs.

Richard O. Rowland is president of the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii, a non-partisan, non-profit public policy institute focused on promoting the free-market, individual freedom and liberty. He can be reached via email at: mailto:dick@grassrootinstitute.org More information about the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii can be found at its Web site at http://www.grassrootinstitute.org