Reining in Spending in Mission Viejo

Re “Mission Viejo, a City on Move,” March 22:

Recently The Times reported that move-in day had arrived at the new Mission Viejo City Hall. Readers learned that the building was supposed to cost between $10 million and $12 million, but that overruns pushed the total to $22million.

Government officials have no incentive to prevent such overruns, since the taxpayers, and not the officials, bear the burden. So why don’t we taxpayers impose the following constraint: If a cost overrun occurs, each and every government official must pay a penalty from their own funds. I’ll bet a percentage of my gross income that this policy will stop cost overruns.

Rod Freed

Mission Viejo