In 2013, the Contra Costa Grand Jury in report 1302 recommended, among other things, that Cities conduct an annual assessment and analysis of in-house vs outsourcing costs and performance. A seemingly reasonable recommendation to SMARTMoraga and common practice in most any organization as they consider "make vs buy" or "insource vs outsource" decisions to maximize efficiency and effectiveness.
Moraga's staff and council think otherwise: in their response to the Grand Jury, they essentially say, "nope, we don't have the time, money or staff to determine whether we are efficiently managing time, money or staff."
"Recommendation #3: ...conduct analyses that estimate the internal cost-of services and weigh that against the cost of outsourcing. For meaningful comparison, analyses should include a measure of the costs related to managing employee payroll, pension and health benefits, workers’ compensation claims, and other personnel management functions...The analyses should be implemented as a formal process, conducted on an annual basis and provided in a written document."
- from Grand Jury Report 1302, dated 4/25/13
"The Town of Moraga will not implement this recommendation because the requirement to conduct an annual analysis of all service provision contracts would require time, money and staff resources that Moraga does not currently possess and cannot afford to add. It is, therefore, not reasonable or a prudent use of the community’s limited resources."
- from Town of Moraga Response Letter, dated 7/10/13