Patricia Lee
@patriciaxlee.eth
GM. Still reading Califailure this morning, now on the chapters about development in Venice Beach and San Jose. I was supposed to officially move into my space tomorrow, but can’t. My application is delayed another week after sitting with the city for a month. I’ve called so often the admin staff recognizes my voice. When I finally reached the planning lead, they offered to review it and call me back later. I asked if they would instead stay on the line and read my application with me. They approved it within minutes. County fire has only responded after I escalated my application to the fire chief through a personal connection. The normal channels led nowhere. Over the decades, California’s public agencies have come to optimize for caution and legal defensibility, not throughput. Delay is often safer, and more rewarded, than action. Our state is notorious for this. Individual persistence can cut through the inertia. But how we can build incentives for momentum into the public system itself?
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polymutex
@polymutex.eth
One half-baked take: Make public service delays costly. Have public services reimburse people for every day of delay, even if it is due to something out of their immediate control. Cap such reimbursements to X% of the state budget, and pass legislation to force this percentage to prohibit raising this percentage (or better, to automatically lower it over time). Cut departments that exceed their budget for 3 years in a row. I'm curious whether the book has any solutions, or if it's only a documentation of the problems.
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Patricia Lee
@patriciaxlee.eth
I’ll take any and all half baked takes :) I’ve seen that with transit systems in other countries where there’s a strong sense of cultural accountability around delays. Interesting to apply to public service, though I can’t imagine it ever being implemented in California. The book feels intentionally vague on specific solutions. The author is running for governor and published the book as his campaign material. So I think he’s trying to appeal widely enough to get elected.
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