In California, state law governing public works of any kind, at any level of government, favors contract work over "In House" labor. There is hardly any contest it is so lopsided. That this bias is written into the law makes no sense, as it often takes as much "In House" labor to regulate an outside consultant as it would take to do the work themselves in the first place.

But paying an outside expert does make sense in selected cases, especially where the public agency has no one on staff with the requisite expertise, or that expertise is already overloaded with other work. That public agencies lack needed expertise in certain areas is a very common problem - caused mostly by the fact that real experts usually can command higher salaries than public agencies can manage to pay directly. And that in turn is mostly due to political demagoguery. Ever hear all the squawking when a public agency does directly pay the actual going rate for any skill - It is usually deafening!

It is stupid that they are then forced to pay the expert's higher salary anyway; plus some contractor's overhead and profit besides. Direct employees are usually much cheaper - at any rate of pay.

But in the case of the NCRA, I don't see the point. What is a consultant supposed to tell them at this point. Any damn fool can figure out that they need an experienced actual operator; someone that won't let the physical plant collapse for their own unwillingness or incompetence to actually maintain it.

OPB