In San Francisco, the City Gets Robbed—and You Get the Bill.

Every few weeks, around 3 a.m., a man wearing a headlamp walks through San Francisco’s Bernal Heights neighborhood carrying the tools for the job.

He bends down, clears away the leaves, removes a screw and pries a small sewer vent grate from the sidewalk. Then he slips it into a bag or grocery cart and moves on to the next house. The entire operation takes less than a minute.

Residents have watched him do it repeatedly on their security cameras. They know what he looks like. They know roughly when he comes. They know how he operates. And when he leaves, he is carrying a bag full of sewer grates.

Not exactly the hardest case to crack.

Neighbors have contacted the police. They have called 311 to report the perfectly square holes left behind in the public sidewalk.

Thankfully, the city responded.

Not by catching the thief. Not by replacing the missing pieces of sidewalk infrastructure. Instead, San Francisco sent homeowners notices giving them 30 days to make the repairs themselves. Otherwise, the city would do the work—and send them the bill.

This is modern government at work: helpless against the thief, remarkably efficient against the homeowner. The thief takes the grate. The resident gets the hole. And the city sends a bill and a deadline.