Back in 2012, I was both amused and horrified to learn that the Greek government actually required entrepreneurs to submit…um…stool samples if they wanted to set up online companies.
Well, there’s apparently a surplus of that…er…material on the streets of San Francisco. A local radio station even shared a map of places to avoid (or to seek out, who am I to judge?).
It’s become such a big problem that the city’s government decided to act. But instead of enforcing rules against public defecation, they’ve created a new bureaucracy. I’m not joking.
Some people are questioning the city’s priorities, as reported by the Sacramento Bee.
San Francisco’s…flush with potty problems — the city has received 14,597 complaints about feces on its sidewalks since January… Now city leaders have unveiled plans for a six-person poop patrol to try to address the issue… But the very concept of a poop patrol inspired skepticism, mockery and, yes, poop emojis… “Instead of telling people to USE A BATHROOM!! San Francisco is going to send out a pooper scooper Patrol to pick it up,” wrote one person. “Lord help us all.” …Others posting to Twitter had questions. “Will the poop patrol get hazardous duty pay?” asked one person, while another wanted to know.
Business Insider has details about this new “poop patrol.”
In San Francisco, you can earn more than $184,000 a year in salary and benefits for cleaning up feces. As members of the city’s “Poop Patrol,” workers are entitled to $71,760 a year, plus an additional $112,918 in benefits… The staffers will begin their efforts each afternoon equipped with a steam cleaner for sanitizing the streets. The full budget for the initiative, $830,977, signifies a concerted effort to address the city’s mounting feces problem, which has resulted in more than 14,500 calls to 311.
That’s a lot of money, though this is a rare instance of where I won’t make my usual argument about bureaucrats being overpaid.
In any event (as is so often the case), bad government policy is the root cause of the problem.
While the high salaries of sanitation workers may incentivize further cleanup, the city will ultimately have to contend with its affordability crisis if it hopes to eliminate the problem. That would mean addressing restrictive zoning laws that make it both difficult and expensive to add affordable developments.
Yes, there’s this simple concept called supply and demand. And when San Francisco politicians don’t let people use their property to create more housing, then ever-higher prices are an inevitable result. But I guess they are too busy dealing with real problems…such as toys in Happy Meals.
To be sure, I’m not under any illusion that abolition of zoning laws and creation of a laissez-faire housing market would completely solve the poop problem. Much of that anti-social behavior is probably linked to mental illness and/or drug abuse.
But less zoning would mean less s**t. Seems like a compelling bumper sticker to me.
P.S. I don’t know if this story belong in my series on “Great Moments in Local Government” or if the poop patrol belongs in the “Bureaucrat Hall of Fame.”
P.P.S. Things can always get worse. Senator Kamala Harris has a hare-brained proposal that would trigger even higher prices for rental housing.
P.P.P.S. San Francisco also has a poop problem even when people use toilets instead of sidewalks.
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it’s normally the case that sleazy socialist politicians and bureaucrats find ways to turn sows ears into silk purses…all they need is an issue… with a few teary eyed youngsters… a gaggle of well meaning but ill informed taxpayers… and presto! higher taxes and more cronyism…the socialist democrat motto: “never let a crisis go to waste”….
“THE BILLION DOLLAR HOMELESS SCAM
The more we spend, the worse it gets.”
August 16, 2018 Daniel Greenfield
https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/271045/billion-dollar-homeless-scam-daniel-greenfield
http://reason.com/blog/2018/08/22/owner-of-san-franciscos-famous-historic?utm_medium=email
defecating on the streets is not a practice that a civilized municipality can tolerate… hepatitis A is killing people in southern California… homelessness and the smell of human excrement is destroying the tourism industry in SF… the city is literally becoming a SH-T hole… over the long term the lack of affordable housing and it’s related maladies will cost the city and state billions in lost revenues… California government is suffering from the same delusions and lunatic policy choices as other crypto-communist jurisdictions around the world… it isn’t much of a stretch to imagine California as a new Venezuelan in a decade or two… (particularly if they were to secede from the union…) the wealth the state has accumulated throughout it’s history can be destroyed in a few years… by a government cursed with a Utopian vision… and a penchant for delusional policy choices… and stupidity… to become a haven for the world’s indigent… rid the government of checks and balances… and rule forever….
who was it who said it’s better to rule in hell… than to serve in heaven…. wasn’t that the socialist democrats?
btw…
“San Francisco Man Prevented from Turning His ‘Historic Laundromat’ Into Apartment Building Is Suing the City for $17 Million”
by Christian Britschgi Aug. 22, 2018 9:45 am
“Robert Tillman’s attempts to build housing have been frustrated by an increasingly ridiculous set of objections.”
The poop problem is minor compared to the fact that residents of San Francisco have to work an additional fifteen years with every penny earned going towards repaying the average San Francisco house.
That is caused by restrictive zoning laws in San Francisco itself, but more importantly by statewide regional zoning laws, whereby San Francisco politicians — and the voter-lemmings who elect them — can prevent creation of new housing not only in San Francisco but also in the wider Bay Area region, so that no city can create cheaper housing in the wider area without San Francisco approval. Hence, no California voter can escape the consequences … of his very own voting pattern.
Ultimately, its a “resource curse”. The geographical endowment of California’s good weather creates bad statist policy. Tesla driving elites govern the homeless — who get what they vote for — and thus ultimately deserve.
Reblogged this on Truth Is Power.