Don’t Expand Bureaucracy

Certainly it’s good news that the Los Angeles City Council is aware that neighborhoods have a problem getting help from the city. Whether it’s a gaping pothole that needs repair, an abandoned house or a broken sidewalk, local residents have long--and legitimately--complained that City Hall can be exasperatingly slow to respond, when someone responds at all.

But proposals being considered by the City Council to create neighborhood councils could layer an expensive new bureaucracy onto the city’s already top-heavy department structure without solving the problem.

Los Angeles’s clunky charter is the cause of much of the anger local residents feel toward their government. The 700-page document has been endlessly amended and expanded since its adoption in 1925; the added “whereas’s” and “therefore’s” have slowed and complicated even the simplest task. When multiple departments and the City Council must get involved in beautifying just one street--requiring multiple permits, inspections and meetings--no wonder some residents become frustrated.

City services can be vastly improved by clarifying the lines of authority between departments and encouraging innovation. That’s a major goal of the two charter reform commissions, one elected, one appointed.

When the panels got started last year, reform looked like an exercise in futility. But they have surprised many early skeptics with their earnest, careful deliberations.

Real charter change now has a chance. Political animals that they are, council members may feel the winds shifting toward support for proposals that streamline departments and may even trim some of the council’s power. And, curiously, now the council is considering motions, some introduced almost two years ago, that could create a needless new “neighborhood services” bureaucracy.

Is it a coincidence that it’s happening now, as charter reform begins to gather steam? Making city officials more accountable and giving residents a greater voice over their neighborhoods animated the reform effort from the outset. Most candidates for the elected panel supported some form of neighborhood councils. Last month, the appointed panel formally embraced the concept of advisory councils.

The best way to improve both accountability and the quality of life throughout the city is to the cut Los Angeles’ gargantuan City Council districts--now 250,000 residents each--to 100,000 residents, a size where concepts like representative government and community control begin to mean something. Then a council member, with the help of field representatives and coordinated city departments, can provide quality service to Los Angeles residents. That’s what everyone wants and needs.

Adding a Department of Neighborhoods, as one proposal contemplates, or fielding a pilot project for neighborhood boards in each council district, will cause more gridlock at City Hall, not less.