THROUGH MY EYES -- RON DAVIS

Last week, about 90,000 residents of Huntington Beach who buy water

from the city were mailed a six-page report by the Public Works Water

Division, entitled “2000 Consumer Confidence Report.” It told us that for

2000, our drinking water has been up to snuff. The cost of printing and

mailing the report? A mere $22,000 of your money.

I found it interesting that I received the report in June 2001,

telling me how my drinking water was in 2000. Excuse me here, but if

there was a problem with the drinking water in January or February 2000,

isn’t it just little late to let me know about it in June 2001?

The fact is, this $22,000 report is an absolute and total waste of

your money, one mandated by the state and federal governments.

Apart from this reporting requirement, Huntington Beach is obligated

to test its water weekly. If there’s a problem, they’re required to

notify the Health Department immediately. And, I presume the Health

Department and the city would take immediate action to remedy the

situation. So, why are we spending $22,000 of your tax money to give you

a six-page water quality report in 2001 for 2000?

The short answer is that the good folks in Sacramento and Washington

thought it would be a good idea, and so they passed a law requiring

cities like Huntington Beach to distribute this report -- all at our

expense.

I don’t quarrel with the idea of periodically analyzing our drinking

water and generally reporting the results to the customers. But that

could have been accomplished by including a statement in our water bills

with a note that the full report was available for review at City Hall.

We don’t need the feds or the state requiring the city to mail six pages

of boring information (boring unless you were anxious to know about

nephelometric turbidity units, pico curies per liter or perchlorates)

that you didn’t request and probably didn’t read.

Which would you rather have for your $22,000: That nifty six-page

“2000 Consumer Confidence Report” mailed to everyone in the city in June

2001 or some extra portable bathrooms on Blufftop Park? (If you opted for

the report, please contact me as I still have some 1999 and 2000

calendars for sale.)

Life is filled with tough choices, but this isn’t one of them. Instead

of a report to line our bird cages or litter boxes, we could have spent

the $22,000 to clean restrooms at the beach or for seniors’ outreach.

In my judgment, this is another classic case of government waste.

These kinds of laws are referred to as unfunded state or federal

mandates. That’s where a higher level of government thinks it would be a

great idea to have a lower level of government do a certain something. So

they pass a law telling local government to do this or that, and often

times, a very expensive this or that, but they seldom send the money

necessary to accomplish the result.

Frankly, I’m not comfortable with the approach taken by the city by

complying with the state and federal mandate in this area. Clearly, the

purpose of the law is fulfilled if the drinking water is analyzed, and

the citizens are made aware that the report is available for their

inspection. Going the extra step and incurring the $22,000 cost of

printing and mailing 90,000 copies of this six-page report is a

government boondoggle. So, if I were the city, I wouldn’t have done it.

I would have invited the state and federal agencies responsible for

policing this law to take action to enforce this stupid law, or change

this stupid law. Unfortunately, as long as cities like Huntington Beach

keep complying with stupid and wasteful laws, we’ll continue to have

them. * RON DAVIS is a private attorney who lives in Huntington Beach.

He can be reached by e-mail at o7 RDD@socal.rr.com.f7