Source:  ABC 7 / UCLA Daily Bruin

By Brady Westwater, Aug. 1, 2014, Citywachla.com

NSIGHT-A lot of ink was spilled over the last few days on why Los Angeles hasn't rebuilt its decaying infrastructure after a good portion of UCLA was flooded by water main break on Sunset Boulevard.

Most commentators - including Jon Christensen and Mark Gold at LA OBSERVED - gave reasons why this has continued to be a problem - and discussed potential solutions to the problem. None of them, however, addressed a major - if not even, the single major reason why the DWP has not replaced our oldest water mains - much less proposed any solution to that problem.

That reason was first made public clear back in 2007 after an internal audit by the DWP showed that if the DWP had to use their own employees - rather than those hired by an outside contractor - it took both twice as long to do the work - and then also cost twice as much money - for the DWP crew to rebuild a truck line than if it had been done by the private contractor.

And the extra time and extra cost was not blamed on the skills or work ethic of the DWP workers. It was attributed to the union work rules which were designed in a way that made the work take twice as long - and cost twice as much money.