Yeah the local state had some efforts to reclassify some state construction rules for work on state facilities. Through years of rando events it came to pass that installing a door required a "metal worker" (I forget the exact term) ... because it involved some metal ... in some way. But generally they were just prefab doors with frames that you drop in. This only seemed to apply to doors and a couple other also "this is actually a cheap job" type situations.

It jacked up the price considerably. Lots of interests end up with some strange outcomes.

I'm increasingly convinced that a good deal of our societies problem is pathological conflict avoidance.

The people we have elected(directly or indirectly) are terrified they might be confronted with the consequences of doing their job, and making a choice. I see the same thing at work, and in my church community.

I've found it's often better to have a direct conflict early, than an prolonged indirect conflict. Having the courage to deliberately engage in it is a whole different ball game though.

Probably.

But people also need to have an actual interest in engaging in the conflict. I refuse to engage at work. You could be shipping passwords in plaintext and I will let you do it, as they are not my users.

In the case of elected officials, it is even worse. Smaller waste can easily go unnoticed, unless you bring it up, fight a lot of people, and get blamed for not finding it earlier. Another thing work has taught me. Cover ups nearly always make sense.

Aside from the cost, the broken thing here is that the process requires so many layers of review and approval, but _everyone_ disapproves of the status quo of feces on the sidewalks. The bathroom needs an environmental review, but sidewalk feces don't, even though they get mixed into storm drains.

You're saying this process arises by trying to not make people unhappy, not leave concerns unaddressed, having layers of accountability. But people are not happy, concerns (ongoing feces) are not addressed, and given that there isn't a person to blame for the ongoing situation there is clearly insufficient accountability.

So how do we fix it without adding yet another layer? All the govt seems to do is add more layers.

You would need two things:

1. Actual rewards in gov for success. In the public sector, the smartest people try nothing new and do not innovate because that would be a dumb thing to do, as you are punished for failure and not rewarded for success.

Someone who delivers a big win should get a big bonus. The problem is that when that has happened, some article will get written and managers will get in trouble over it.

2. Tolerance for missteps, delays, and schedule changes.

I spend 2 weeks fixing a hard to solve bug for my private sector unicorn? No big deal. Maybe talk about it a bit in retro and move on.

In my public sector job? At least three meetings on why we missed the sprint goal. Why? As someone above wants to cover their ass on missing the sprint goal. And we will write up a several page doc on why we missed the sprint goal.

Someone takes a chance on a much cheaper contractor and it doesn't work out? They can't be dragged to meeting after meeting having to defend it. That is how you get people hiring IBM for failed project after failed project, because at least they can say "IBM is the standard practice."

We start regarding public servants with some respect instead of someone to be yelled at.

A culture shift.

You are right more regulations/another layer isn't going to help.

A culture shift, yes.

Back to the idea that public servants are indeed servants to the public, and their entire purpose is to spend the public's money in a way that benefits the public.

I've heard horror stories on HN which would justify your cynicism, and agree that corruption is a problem. See also issues with police and accountability.

You might be surprised, however, at what percentage of federal bureaocracy does see themselves as civil servants.

The culture shift can be done. And it is well worth it, for everyone's sake. Corruption represents a Nash equilibrium, once rooted it is very hard to remove.

That's why I'm defending government workers here. We want good, effective government. This requires good, effective people to carry out the work. Making this respectable and letting those people do their job is pretty key to getting that good government.

The principles aren't so different from managing a team of software engineers. Would you enjoy working (in software) in a company where sales and marketing was always blaming the engineers, and HR was always calling the engineers lazy, and management was constantly shifting priorities while blaming engineers for not hitting targets, etc...

So why create the same environment for government workers? Why not treat them with the same professional respect you'd expect/hope for in your job?

And why not call out the politician as the a*hat when he insults the people trying to get the job done?

You say that like these public servants care about everyone but the taxpayers footing the bill.

I don't personally care about anything as a public servant beyond covering my ass. Joe Taxpayer does get screwed, but he gets screwed by the collective decision making satisfying everyone else, so I can't get in trouble for it.

Joe Taxpayer doesn't show up to the planning meetings. Joe Taxpayer doesn't submit anything to the feedback forms. Joe Taxpayer doesn't care enough about any particular project to really win.