ORANGE COUNTY PERSPECTIVE : An Opportunity to Reinvent Our Polity

First the Clinton Administration, and now the Republicans poised to take power in Congress, have preached the gospel of “reinventing government.” Closer to home, the Orange County Board of Supervisors, stunned by the county’s bankruptcy and pilloried by constituents, has agreed to see how to restructure government to make it leaner, more responsive to residents and cheaper.

These ideas have been discussed periodically for decades, but have never borne more than the most meager fruit. These are far different times. As Supervisor Roger R. Stanton stated, correctly, the voters do not want to see the county emerge from the financial rubble as a mere pared-down clone of its former self.

The restructuring effort is sensibly being designed to include local talent from the private sector, community groups and professional organizations. These are people with a stake in government, and ideas that should be heard. To say the least, the county has their interest and attention at this particular moment. The standing of the supervisors and the county bureaucracy is so low that anything the politicians propose without including knowledgeable outsiders is likely to be lacking in credibility.

The task will be difficult. A quick solution might be to switch from being a general-law county, as Orange and most other counties in the state are now, to a charter-law county, like Los Angeles and San Bernardino. In general, that would let the supervisors appoint more department heads, such as the treasurer, rather than requiring that they be elected. But while the county needs to consolidate services and eliminate positions as need be, changing the form of government is not a good idea for now. It would require approval by the voters, who may prefer not to cede so much power to the supervisors, especially in view of records indicating that they waved through requests for extensive borrowing for risky investments as recently as September.

Surveys of local elected officials in recent years have shown many agree that it is possible to consolidate services such as water delivery, air-quality management and transportation. But when it comes to consolidating police and fire services, parks and schools, debate can be fierce, with local control jealously guarded.

The past decade has witnessed an increasing number of incorporationswithin Orange County. The need to plan how to develop open land, a major function of the county, has lessened. But the county still performs needed functions, such as administering state and federal funds for welfare and health programs.

Restructuring is needed, and there never will be a better time to make it happen. Orange County must save money and create a new vision of itself for the future.