why would a private company, put in charge by the government, not do the bare minimum to maintain their contract, and pocket the rest as profit? Disney isn’t maintaining their potholes out of the goodness of their hearts.
The motivation to do a good job is that they also take on liability for damages caused by lack of maintenance that is either foreseeable, or non-foreseeable issues that had been reported to them in their area of responsibility. The government tracks pothole reports, and if you hit a road hazard that had already been reported with enough time to repair it, the company pays.
Its all about lining up the incentives properly. Plenty of government road maintenance departments are perfectly capable of not fixing things and wasting money without the profit motive nvolved.
EDITed for copy, correctness, and to add the better wiki link
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reedy_Creek_Improvement_Distri...