Riordan Makes Long Trek for Short Pitch

Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan came to Congress on Thursday like a parent to the principal’s office, asking the federal government to overlook past sins and continue to fund transportation projects beset by bad management, hapless construction and political squabbling.

But he traveled 2,300 miles to make a pitch that lasted all of six minutes. Hardly anybody from the all-important House transportation subcommittee was in attendance, as congressmen and congresswomen hurried off to Pennsylvania for a weekend retreat where they are supposed to atone for years of bipartisan meanness and reflect upon ways to make nice.

The mayor was making nice too--trying to convince legislators, who have been skeptical as to whether Los Angeles can still be trusted to spend federal transportation money wisely. And he seemed unfazed by the scanty reception, talking to mostly empty seats and striking the refrain that will underscore California’s uphill fight for federal money in the coming months: Los Angeles, with its bustling airports and busy harbors, must keep moving if the nation is to prosper.

“Today in Los Angeles, 6.5 million people will drive to work, 1 million people will ride our buses and 100,000 people will use our rail system,” Riordan told the subcommittee that will help decide California’s share of a $175-billion, five-year transportation fund. “This daily buzz of cars, buses and trains crisscrossing our region forms the lifelines that make Los Angeles the 20th-largest economy in the world, generating more economic activity than all but eight states in America.”

The money is crucial if Los Angeles is to meet its exploding transportation needs in the 21st century. And the mayor’s trek to Washington, playing the role of responsible father explaining away the misdeeds of a bratty Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority, was testament to that. Even if few were actually there to hear him, the actual words the mayor said were probably less important than the symbolic message of his presence: that if Congress is still willing to put up the money, the mayor is willing to be publicly responsible for how it is handled.

The warm welcome the mayor received from the few members of Congress in attendance failed to signal the shark fight ahead as Los Angeles goes after $723 million over the next five years for seven bus, rail and highway projects that some Washington lawmakers consider “snakebitten.”

“Winston Churchill said any person can come up with a perfect strategy to win a war so long as they are not responsible for waging the war,” the mayor said in veiled reference to some spectacular MTA foul-ups.

But it remains to be seen whether the mayor’s words will carry the necessary weight to overcome the MTA’s smudged reputation.

Legislators tend to move any projects perceived as troubled to the bottom of the list, and Los Angeles has had its share of problems.

There was the Hollywood Boulevard sinkhole, the enormous cost overruns, allegations of fraud, an MTA official convicted of taking kickbacks and revelations that the original subway tunnel walls were dangerously thin and in need of reconstruction.

Further, the Los Angeles-based Bus Riders Union is threatening to go to court if sufficient funds are not used for new and improved buses, the mode of transportation most often used by the county’s poor. The bus riders group sued the MTA and won a consent decree last year making improvement of the nation’s second-largest bus system a priority.

And members of Congress from Los Angeles disagree about the order in which the Red Line extensions should be constructed, with the Eastside at odds with the San Fernando Valley--none of which looks good from a Washington perspective.

“The Los Angeles subway is snakebitten with the sinkhole, the safety questions,” one committee staffer said. “Los Angeles is going to have to prove to us they can pull people off of Pico Boulevard to ride this thing. People ain’t gonna leave their cars to get on the Red Line.”

All of this comes before a Congress reluctant to spend, and the requests for transit projects are pouring in from around the country.

In an interview with reporters, Riordan was candid about the subway’s spotted reputation.

“Our record is not something I would want but it’s far from the worst in the country,” Riordan said. “I am confident this money will be very well spent. We have had a new head of construction, and have brought in the best outside help in the country to make sure the mistakes of the past will be a lesson for the future.”

But there is still much convincing to do, and the competition will undoubtedly get stiffer as the full Transportation Committee rolls up its sleeves and begins to divvy up the pot.

“Things are going to get tougher,” said Jeff Nelligan, committee spokesman. “L.A.’s request is symbolic of the desperate need across the nation, a perfect symbol of what is needed in the other 49 states. Whether it’s a $3-million intersection or a $1.6-billion bridge, they all strike the same note of passion.”

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Still, the mayor and some of the California legislators he lobbied Thursday before heading home remained optimistic.

“Everybody has an uphill fight,” said Rep. Ellen Tauscher (D-Walnut Creek), a committee member. “This is an embarrassment of poverty. We don’t have a huge amount of money to divvy up. Everyone gets something and everyone doesn’t get something.”