VOTE Needs to Back Off

If, as appears likely, the California Assembly and Gov. Pete Wilson follow the Senate’s lead and extend the deadline for petitions demanding a study of San Fernando Valley secession, activists pushing the cause should drop their federal lawsuit against the Los Angeles City Council. Pressing legal action only aggravates a fight that has degenerated into little more than shin kicking and name calling.

Last week, the Senate approved emergency legislation granting Valley Voters Organized Toward Empowerment, or Valley VOTE, an additional three months to gather the signatures of 135,000 Valley voters. The bill could clear the Assembly by the end of the week. Wilson has said he probably will sign the bill, which passed the Senate unanimously and needs a two-thirds majority in the Assembly. Its passage is warranted by the heavy-handed action of Los Angeles police and security officers who barred Valley VOTE volunteers from last month’s Van Nuys Aviation Expo.

Valley VOTE’s petition demands that the Local Agency Formation Commission, or LAFCO, study the fiscal fallout of the Valley divorcing the rest of Los Angeles and incorporating as an independent city. If the Valley could survive financially as its own city without harming the rest of Los Angeles, the decision would go to voters citywide.

Municipal detachment would be a costly, complicated process that would fracture the nation’s second-largest city. No one denies that Los Angeles government is dysfunctional, but two groups--one elected, one appointed--are working diligently to reform the city’s charter. Fixing bad government rather than just duplicating it holds the best hope for reconnecting residents to their city.

Valley VOTE leaders correctly note that they helped give birth to charter reform, but then they left it to die in the crib when their favorites for the elected panel lost a vote of the people. Rather than participate in the democratic process, they began circulating secession petitions.

Unless the extension passes, the group faces a Thursday deadline. In general, petition drives seeking to redraw city boundaries get six months to collect the signatures of 25% of registered voters in the affected area. But in a controversial quirk of law, big cities get only three months. Legislators rightly thought it should be difficult to break apart a world-class city like Los Angeles. After Valley VOTE was barred from the air show, though, Assemblyman Bob Hertzberg (D-Sherman Oaks) and City Councilwoman Laura Chick worked together on a legislative extension.

In a perverse way, Valley VOTE owes thanks to the guards who kept the group out of the air show. Based on information from Valley VOTE and independent petition consultants, it appeared last week that the group was running behind schedule and could fail to meet the original Aug. 27 deadline. The group predictably blamed the city for its shortage. Immediately after the air show, Valley VOTE leaders said they had planned to collect 15,000 signatures at the event. By last week, that estimate ballooned as high as 40,000.

The inflated number coincided with the filing of a lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of the group. Valley VOTE leaders want the city to pay for a new campaign if the current one fails. Cost to taxpayers: as much as $300,000. This on top of the potential millions the group expects the public to pay to study secession. But that’s the way Valley VOTE seems to operate: pointing fingers and expecting someone else to pick up the bill.