City’s water use wasteful at beach restrooms I’m puzzled. We are supposed to be in a drought. We have been asked by the city over and over again to save water. There are restrooms down in Pacific Beach with toilets that waste a lot of water. With every flush, gallons and gallons go down the drain.  Recently, the restroom at Law Street and Ocean Walk was closed for renovations. Great, I thought. Now, surely, the water waste will be addressed and low-flush toilets will be installed. Wrong. After several months for renovation, I discovered that the newly installed toilets flushed even more water. I have been taking the water crisis seriously. My husband and I have installed low-flush toilets, shower every three days and do the laundry and dishwasher only when full. We’ve taken out our lawn, put in imitation grass, re-landscaped with rocks, boulders and drought-tolerant plants.  So I ask, Mayor Jerry Sanders, what is the city doing to save water? Why did the city install these high-volume flush toilets? I would hope the city would lead by example. Roberta Whitby, Pacific Beach So the city water reduction plan will feature prescribed watering days, penalties, fines and other micromanagement measures, and require hiring ten new code compliance people, soon to be dubbed the “water police,” no doubt. They will follow up on alleged violations and respond to complaints by neighbors snitching on each other. If you wonder why government at every level seems to grow inexorably, it’s stuff like this that drives it. Recently, a UCSD economics professor described in the Union Tribune a sensible water usage reduction plan, relying on market forces. It featured steeply incremental cost increases for each additional unit, say, each 200 cubic feet of water used, and proposed sharp reductions in the fixed portion of the water bill, which currently averages about two thirds of total costs. Thus, the user could see clearly how each additional unit used raised his costs and he or she would be highly motivated to cut usage. Unless you don’t think price affects behavior, this is guaranteed to reduce usage substantially. When I mentioned it to my local council member’s office, it was explained to me that it’s not that simple. There are apparently state laws restricting how much extra you can charge for added increments of usage, and the city claims to be stuck with the proposed plan, devised, of course, by the Water Department bureaucracy, until they can work out something simpler. By the time they figure that out, we’ll have ten new employees full of entitlements making it difficult, if not impossible, to get rid of them. Still, it’s good to know that least someone is hiring during this recession! Ready for additional cuts in library hours? Bill Bradshaw, Pacific Beach