=The Need for Better Co-operation among City Departments.=—The greatest obstacle to satisfactory work on the part of city officials is the absence of close co-operation among the various city departments. Some heads of departments are elected; some are appointed. Even when they are all chosen in the same way they often fail to work in complete harmony. Each department is jealous of its own functions and anxious to follow its own policy.[78] [Sidenote: Some examples.] Each desires all the credit when things go right and wants none of the blame when things go wrong. The various departments, when unpleasant or unpopular tasks have to be performed, often try to put the responsibility on someone else. They have become very proficient in what is colloquially known as “passing the buck”. The result is that team play is usually lacking, and friction is not at all uncommon. How frequently we see examples of this failure to save the city’s money by co-operation! The street department puts down a new pavement; but the surface is scarcely dry before the water department proceeds to tear it up in order to lay new mains, or the sewer department sends its men along to dig a new manhole, or the gas and electric light employees come with picks and shovels to make excavations in it. Why not do all this before the new pavement goes down? In the city of Boston nearly ten thousand excavations are made in the streets during a single year. Some of these are unavoidable, no doubt, but many of them are simply the result of poor planning or no planning at all. Or, take another illustration. Many city departments require materials and supplies of the same sort. Coal, for example, is needed in police stations, fire stations, the schools, the city hall, and all other public buildings. Why not get together, buy it all in one large order at wholesale prices, pay spot cash, and secure a discount, instead of having each department purchase its own supplies in relatively small quantities from local dealers? The answer is that each department, jealous of its own independence, usually goes ahead in all its activities without informing the others or consulting them. The situation is not nearly so bad nowadays as it was twenty or more years ago but there is still plenty of room for more effective co-operation.[79] CITY PLANNING AND PUBLIC WORKS [Sidenote: The lack of planning.]