Great Moments in Government Paternalism
Not sure this even requires comment.
Chandler's new City Hall comes with some features that have municipal workers and visitors scratching their heads. Like the restroom signs that tell people not to drink out of the urinals and toilets.
...
A few employees have been cracking jokes and speculating about what it would take to make them slurp from potties when water fountains and sinks are a few feet away.
"I'm glad that I saw that sign because I was very thirsty and looking for a means to quench my thirst," Mayor Boyd Dunn quipped. "Seriously, I'm certain there's some regulation out there that requires that type of sign."
Ken:
I am certain that John Cole could construct a cogent argument about why making fun of this makes you an unbalanced gun-toting teabagger glibertarian poopy-head, and all his canine commenters would agree.
November 10, 2010, 6:54 pmMichael:
The signs are for the animals. We can have the blind or their assistant animals walking around the office with potty breath.
November 10, 2010, 9:15 pmNoumenon:
The stupid thing is that we have been wasting drinkable-quality water in our urinals and toilets for so long. I support putting up the signs just to raise awareness about grey water as a normal possibility.
November 11, 2010, 2:05 amXmas:
They could have said, "The urinals and toilets help our conservations efforts by using nonpotable gray water." But, nonpotable is too smart of a word.
November 11, 2010, 2:43 amcaseyboy:
Cut them a break. Our enlightened leaders believe the common man is stupid enough to drink from a urinal. Of course if they are stupid enough to drink from a urinal they probably can't read. Maybe a visual is required, Man bending down with head in urinal and the good old red circle with diagonal line crossing through.
November 11, 2010, 7:26 amNot Sure:
"Our enlightened leaders believe the common man is stupid enough to drink from a urinal."
I wonder what sort of leader someone that stupid might vote for...
November 11, 2010, 12:02 pmEscapedWestOfTheBigMuddy:
@Noumenon: Stupid is relative.
Serving toilets with untreated water requires either a parallel distribution system or a system for locally caching gray water. Each is expensive and complicated in some degree, so it does not make sense until the marginal cost to the potable water systems rises high enough.
Or would you rather people had kept using outhouses until the extra resources could be mustered?
It's clear that we have passed the point where two systems makes sense in some places. Not clear that we have passed that point everywhere.
November 11, 2010, 12:07 pmcaseyboy:
Too bad you don't get much rain in AZ. You could put a catch basin on the roof and gravity feed rainwater down for flushing. Or set a timer to do a once a day flush whether it is needed or not. That and using a single square of toilet paper could save the planet. Wow, I must be channeling Al Gore.
November 11, 2010, 12:37 pmEvil Red Scandi:
This is up there with a hypothetical (so far... knock on wood) warning sticker that somebody came up for for windows: "Please do not chew or make love to the glass."
November 11, 2010, 1:14 pmmarkm:
It's for the werewolf population, of course!
Seriously, it's hard enough to persuade building inspectors to allow gray water systems at all. If they decide that the regulation requiring "do not drink" warnings at all points the gray water can be accessed means all points, you'll just be glad they picked something silly and cheap to insist upon. Usually it's something silly and prohibitively expensive...
November 11, 2010, 4:38 pmTimG:
I don't no the origin of this particular sign but off these aburd warnings exist because of fear of lawsuits and not 'nanny statism'.
November 11, 2010, 4:54 pmDr. T:
A more appropriate sign would read:
Politicians and government bureaucrats have no gray matter.
November 11, 2010, 7:33 pmPlease do not expect them to think.