A couple weeks back I accompanied a coworker on a story at the headquarters of the Ghana Water Commission, the public agency charged with managing the nation's water resources. Near the office, we saw signs for the Volta River Authority, which is manages the generation and distribution of the country's electrical energy for commercial and domestic use. My coworker explained to me that both of these agencies raise some of their revenues through private enterprises like club houses and real estate rentals because the federal government does not have enough money in its budget to cover all the agencies' needs. By contrast, in the US, such public agencies tend to rely completely on the government for funding.
I was reminded of this conversation recently while talking to a taxi driver about the police department, which like most public agencies here is underfunded and is therefore unable to pursue many criminal investigations. I mentioned that in the US, many police departments fund themselves by collecting fines for things like traffic violations. He said that this was not a feasible solution to their problems here because most traffic officers confronting a violator would rather collect a small fee for themselves than a large fine for the department, and drivers are obviously happy to pay the smaller amount.
I'm curious to learn more about how public institutions finance themselves using private means if anyone has any information on this.
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