Dixon’s Out--but Is Accountability In? : County supervisors must take ultimate responsibility for official actions

Ever since a succession of Times articles spelled out, in detail painful to any taxpayer, the Alice-in-Wonderland financial antics of Los Angeles County officials, Chief Administrative Officer Richard B. Dixon has been the target of much public wrath. He did, after all, spend $6.1 million to renovate his county offices and was the brain behind the pension hikes that will cost taxpayers $265 million. The Los Angeles County Grand Jury has harshly criticized Dixon’s lavish spending and unchecked powers.

Dixon, having suddenly lost the backing of onetime ally Supervisor Deane Dana, said Tuesday he will resign. The political handwriting was on the wall; Supervisor Gloria Molina has long wanted Dixon fired, and at least three of the five board members would have been lined up to vote for his ouster once a new supervisor was elected in November to replace retiring Supervisor Kenneth Hahn. So Dixon announced that he will leave office by the end of the year. But lest any taxpayer watchdogs pop champagne corks, they should remember what Dixon himself said earlier this year about his tremendous power over the fate of tax dollars. “When it comes right down to it, I’m just their messenger boy,” he said of the supervisors. “I really have nothing they don’t give me.”

He was right, and it’s an important warning to remember as the supervisors contemplate life in the county Hall of Administration in the post-Dixon era. As Times stories pointed out, Dixon had more authority to award contracts than even Gov. Pete Wilson. He could rearrange department budgets at will. He maintained open-ended expense accounts for himself and the Board of Supervisors.

Elected officials delegated this power to the unelected Dixon. It served their purpose for Dixon, accountable only to the board, to quietly authorize controversial and questionable spending rather than for the supervisors, accountable to the public, to openly authorize such spending and take the heat from constituents.

Well, as Dana, who is in a tough reelection battle, can testify, supervisors took the heat anyway. And now’s the time for the board to consider how to ensure that the disturbing power shift that occurred under Dixon’s tenure never happens again. Members must consider an idea long promoted by Supervisor Ed Edelman--that the county needs and deserves an elected county executive akin to a mayor. How many legislative and administrative functions can five supervisors do for a county of 9 million? Dixon was a symptom; his resignation alone is not the cure.