New Transit Bill Helps Robbins Revive Image as a Deal Maker

One year ago, with his two major transit bills dead in Sacramento, state Sen. Alan Robbins threatened to bolt from the Democratic Party and re-register as an independent.

As political observers expected, the Van Nuys Democrat never made the jump.

Detractors suggested the threat was a smoke screen to cover a bruised political ego.

Whatever the reason, this year Robbins is making no such threats. In the legislative session that concluded last week, he surprised many of his detractors by securing passage of a transit bill that benefits the San Fernando Valley.

Critics have noted that the bill--a controversial measure that would compel Los Angeles County transit officials to place Valley rail money in a trust fund--was watered down substantially in an effort to win the backing of the Valley’s full legislative delegation, which proved essential in the last-minute struggle for passage.

Further, there remains a strong possibility of a veto by Gov. George Deukmejian.

But for the moment, Robbins appears to be enjoying what qualified success he has achieved, hoping his 1988 record will shore up his tarnished image as a crafty vote-trader who can shape legislation to his wishes.

Since winning election to the Senate as a political novice in 1973, Robbins has prided himself on being an effective wheeler-dealer whose political skills are committed to securing legislation favorable to the Valley.

In recent years, transit legislation has been his vehicle of choice for giving substance to that public image.

Role ‘Unavoidable’

The involvement of the East Valley Democrat in local transit issues was “unavoidable in a way,” said one Senate aide who has observed Robbins at close quarters and asked not to be identified. “Almost every route suggested goes through his district. Plus, his people are hollering for help and he claims to be a big cheese in Sacramento.”

Robbins frequently depicts the Valley as a forgotten community that would get nothing from state and regional transit officials were it not for his legislative efforts and those of other Valley elected officials.

“Sometimes, we have to throw our weight around and make pests of ourselves,” he said in a recent interview. “Without that, the rest of Los Angeles has a tendency to put us on the back burner.”

While most Valley civic, business and homeowner group leaders agree with that sentiment, Robbins has run into difficulty drafting legislation that appeals to all Valley groups.

His first effort, in 1984, was an unqualified victory. In that instance, Robbins parlayed the need for Valley political support for the Metro Rail subway into passage of a bill that required the start of construction on the Valley end of the subway one year after the Sept. 29, 1986, ground-breaking in downtown.

The same bill also required regional transit officials to spend on the Valley segment of Metro Rail 15% of the non-federal funds spent on construction of other portions of the system.

When transit planners committed all available funds to the first 4.4-mile downtown segment, they looked to Robbins for relief from the 1984 bill’s deadline.

Delaying Deadline

In August, 1987, after defiantly declaring for months that he would be in court on Sept. 30 to force construction in the Valley, Robbins unveiled legislation that gave the subway builders a two-year delay, but created a trust fund into which the Valley’s share of Metro Rail would be placed.

In return for giving ground on the subway deadline, the legislation would have banned the construction of a light-rail line through residential areas of North Hollywood and Van Nuys.

That provision was a response to demands from some of Robbins’ constituents who are battling a proposal by the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission to build a trolley line from the Metro Rail terminus in North Hollywood to Warner Center--a route that traverses several single-family neighborhoods.

However, Valley business leaders, long among the most ardent supporters of Robbins, a moderate to conservative Democrat, quickly joined the county Transportation Commission in opposing the bill.

Robbins said at the time that the business opposition “hurts a lot.” But he dismissed the commission’s position as “not very important” since he was confidently expecting passage of another bill that would abolish the commission.

That bill, which Robbins co-sponsored with Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sepulveda), would have replaced the commission and the Southern California Rapid Transit District with a new agency in charge of all transit planning and bus operations.

After much high-visibility maneuvering by Robbins, the Valley transit bill was passed by the Assembly but died in the Senate on the final night of the 1987 session when several senators questioned the wisdom of the state influencing the selection of rail routes.

The transit reorganization bill, on the other hand, was approved by the Legislature but vetoed by Deukmejian. Efforts to revive it this year were unsuccessful.

Thus Robbins, who had boldly predicted a double success in the 1987 session, ended with nothing to show but several highly visible chinks in his legislative armor.

Early in the 1988 session, Robbins secured passage of legislation that postponed the start of Metro Rail tunneling from Universal City to North Hollywood until Sept. 29, 1989, and placed the Valley’s subway funds in a trust account.

Interest from the account is to be used to subsidize an Oxnard-to-Los Angeles commuter rail train that Robbins hopes to have operating next year on Southern Pacific railroad tracks.

But to the disappointment of light-rail opponents, the bill, which passed with only token opposition, contained no protections for their neighborhoods.

A month ago, Robbins unexpectedly reentered the transit arena with a bill that, like his 1987 legislation, seemed to give regional transit officials something they wanted in return for something Robbins wanted for the Valley.

Robbins’ bill would lift the $100-million bond ceiling on borrowing for Metro Rail, which he confidently predicted that regional transit officials would need to put together a plan to pay for Metro Rail’s second phase.

In return for lifting the bond limit, the bill banned construction of a ground-level or elevated rail line in residential areas of North Hollywood, Van Nuys, Reseda and Woodland Hills.

The bill also set up a second Valley trust fund, this one to contain 15% of all funds the county Transportation Commission spends on rail projects.

Finally, interest from the fund was earmarked to subsidize a second Valley commuter rail line.

Plan Disintegrated

“Every few years the transit agencies need something from us up here,” Robbins said at the time, “and then we get a chance to come up with a plan that gets something for the Valley.”

But within days, Robbins’ carefully crafted plan fell apart.

First, transit planners announced they could build Metro Rail all the way to North Hollywood without an increase in the bonding limit.

Then, homeowners group leaders, increasingly militant in their opposition to light-rail routes in residential areas, found fault with the wording of Robbins’ bill.

“It doesn’t protect us from a line along the Ventura Freeway--in fact it seems to encourage such a line--and it doesn’t stop the LACTC from placing tracks in a deep, open trench” from North Hollywood to Warner Center, said Encino homeowners group leader Gerald A. Silver, chairman of the All Valley Transportation Coalition, which opposes a ground-level east-west rail line.

Robbins quickly stripped the protective zones from the bill, but retained the Valley trust fund and the repeal of the Metro Rail bonding limit.

By taking out the protective zones, Robbins picked up essential backing from Valley business groups and from several key Valley legislators, including Assemblywoman Marian W. La Follette (R-Northridge), who carried the bill in the Assembly and whose support made the issue bipartisan.

Warner Center attorney Roger L. Stanard, who supported the bill after the neighborhood protective zones were removed, termed Robbins’ last-minute make-over of the bill “a classic Alan Robbins maneuver.”

Effort to Kill Bill

In the final hours of the 1988 session last Thursday, legislators from other areas of Los Angeles County joined county Transportation Commission officials in trying to kill the bill, saying it set a precedent that would encourage other areas to try to set up trust funds.

In the Assembly, it took three separate votes over several hours to get the 41 votes needed for passage.

Between votes, Robbins circulated on the floor with a roll call sheet, urging individual Assembly members to vote for his bill.

He called the tactic “old-fashioned arm-twisting. I remind them they have bills on which they want my support.”

Finally approved 44 to 21, the measure was rushed to the Senate, which passed it five hours later, 24 to 9.

Deukmejian has 15 days from the date of passage to veto or sign the measure.

Opponents have vowed to wage a letter-writing campaign to encourage a veto, while Robbins and others have started a similar effort to secure Deukmejian’s support.

In an interview following the bill’s passage, Robbins said that even if the bill is vetoed, he would not be talking anytime soon about quitting the Democratic Party.

“Every few years I have to talk independent in order to get the attention of some of my Democratic colleagues,” he said. “But this wasn’t that kind of year.”