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Simple Tools at Work in a Complex Era

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By 11 a.m., coffee and tea had been served, the flag saluted and a prayer said. The meeting of the Los Angeles County Institutional Inspection Commission, with Sybil Brand presiding, had begun.

The county supervisors have appointed more than 70 similar commissions to help them shape policy. Some have a certain amount of power; others, like the Institutional Inspection Commission, are purely advisory.

One reason is obvious. Supervisors can award friends and political supporters with appointments. They also provide the supervisors a way of receiving varied advice, helping counter criticisms it is too narrow for the needs of a diverse county.

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The system was designed for simpler times--before jail overcrowding, AIDS, child abuse and all the other issues now facing county government. Unfortunately, as the story of the inspection commission shows, the old structure remains.

The inspection commission, meeting in the living room of Brand’s home in Beverly Hills while she recovers from knee surgery, heard a report from a member back from inspecting the West Los Angeles jail. He told the commission that 45 prisoners were in a holding cell built for 20, the temperature control was broken in the women’s holding cell and “the gals were freezing.”

The information was diligently recorded by the commission secretary, into the group’s minutes. These minutes are available to any member of the public who can track them down at the County Hall of Administration.

It all is very Dickensian. Dickensian in the sense that the courts and departments in Charles Dickens’ novels--the Court of Chancery, the Department of Circumlocution--gave the impression of doing something when, in fact, they were designed to do nothing.

Sybil Brand is not a do-nothing person. Long before the term was invented, Brand and her late husband, Harry, were a power couple in the Los Angeles of the 1930s, ‘40s and ‘50s.

Sybil was a famous fund-raiser for charity and politicians. Harry, who was brilliant at manipulating the press, created stars for 20th Century Fox.

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At 86, she is still a formidable presence. Recently, she sat next to the former sheriff, Peter Pitchess, at a banquet. The master of ceremonies was the current sheriff, Sherman Block. Pitchess no longer likes Block, even though he had helped the current sheriff get his job.

Pitchess said something insulting about Block. “Pete,” said Brand, a friend of both men, “I don’t want you to talk like that.”

Brand was a member of the inspection commission in the 1950s when she learned about appalling conditions in the women’s jail in the old Hall of Justice. She remembers, “I called up my darling Kenny Hahn and told him that but for the grace of God your wife or I could be there.” Hahn, at the beginning of his long supervisorial career, found temporary quarters for some of the women. But this didn’t satisfy Brand. “I am going to build a new jail,” she announced.

She went to the studio chiefs she knew through Harry and asked for money to wage a bond-issue campaign. It was old Hollywood, still strong on the tradition of War Bond drives and the Hollywood Canteen. The bond issue won and Sybil Brand Institute was opened in 1963.

By the mid-1970s, the jails were crowded again and this time it was too difficult to be solved by well-intentioned volunteerism.

Crime was increasing and becoming more violent. Today, there are 23,000 prisoners in a jail system built for 13,000.

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In a series of lawsuits filed in federal court, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Greater Watts Justice Center and the Los Angeles County Bar Assn. demanded changes from the supervisors, the sheriff and the courts. After a long trial, Federal Judge William Gray assumed jurisdiction over the jails.

Thus it is the judge, not the supervisors or the sheriff, who is the commanding presence over the jail. This makes the commission irrelevant.

The supervisors have tried to find more money, difficult in this time of high crime and the lingering effects of Proposition 13. But blame can’t be placed entirely on money.

Intellectual and political gridlock is also to blame. Few new ideas emerge from county government on easing crowding. As an example of political inaction, county officials privately say that the judges must share some of the blame for building up a backlog in county jails of prisoners awaiting trial. But because they fear the political power of the judges, the supervisors will not do anything drastic, such as make them work nights.

Over the years, solutions have been suggested for the quandary of antiquated structure illustrated so well by the inspections commission. A strong county executive, a bigger, and more representative Board of Supervisors, regional government are among them. Those suggesting such steps say that Los Angeles County is now too big for a single, strong-minded reformer such as Sybil Brand to make a difference. Time has passed the supervisors by.

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