Bill to Abolish RTD Picks Up New Support After Senate OKs Changes

A bill to abolish the RTD picked up much needed support Tuesday from a batch of major changes in the legislation that turned former foes into supporters, including Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley.

The Senate late Tuesday by voice vote adopted a series of amendments sought by Bradley and other local elected officials, including one that bars any state legislator from serving on a powerful new transportation “super-agency” board.

“The mayor says the bill has been dramatically and substantially improved,” said Deputy Mayor Michael Gage, shortly after the vote. “He supports the bill in its present form.”

The legislation, prompted by revelations of mismanagement at the RTD and poorly coordinated transportation planning, still faces several hurdles. But the mayor’s endorsement, coupled with the announcement that another past opponent, the League of California Cities, would now support the bill greatly improves chances that the measure will pass the Legislature and be sent to the governor, possibly this week.

“Transportation reform is much closer,” said the bill’s chief author, Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sepulveda).

The changes, negotiated over the Labor Day weekend and in a flurry of phone calls Tuesday, would ensure that only local elected officials serve on the new board. They also would give the new board greater flexibility in contracting and hiring during a six-month changeover period leading to full control by the new agency. However, the bill retains language banning RTD General Manager John Dyer and Los Angeles County Transportation Commission executive director Rick Richmond from becoming the county’s new transportation czar.

The changes were part of a last-ditch strategy by the authors to knock down a groundswell of opposition to the legislation. Katz and the bill’s co-author, Sen. Alan Robbins (D-Van Nuys), began making major concessions after the full Senate rejected the measure Friday.

With Tuesday’s amendments, the Senate is scheduled to reconsider the bill today.

The bill would create on Jan. 1 a new Metropolitan Transportation Authority to combine and replace the Southern California Rapid Transit District and the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission. An 11-member panel of elected officials, including Bradley and the five county supervisors, would govern the MTA, which would consolidate bus, rail and highway planning under one umbrella organization. One unresolved issue, which will be debated today, is what sorts of limits should be placed on political fund raising by board members of the new agency, which will control billions of dollars on contracts.

Katz and Robbins on Tuesday proposed that board members, in the future, be limited to receiving $500 from those doing business with the agency. As is, new MTA board members would be disqualified from voting on any matter involving those who have contributed $250 or more.

The authors and members of the county Board of Supervisors say the current law is too restrictive and could paralyze the new board’s ability to function because members have taken contributions from thousands of donors.