Why we love bureaucracy (and outsourcing)
It's been a decade since this California city's data center installed a high-heat and subfloor-water alert system in the wake of some air-conditioning failures, reports the IT pilot fish in charge of it.
"The system is monitored by a commercial company and has worked perfectly," says fish. "But we just got a notification and invoice from the city police department's Alarm Compliance unit, telling us we need to pay for an alarm permit.
"I decided not to go through having the police department become a vendor on the city's finance system, which they should to be paid. Instead, I took the purchasing credit card, went to the city cashier with the invoice and asked to charge it and give me a receipt so we can move on.
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