CRA Revamp Urged to Boost Efficiency

The Community Redevelopment Agency is hampered by internal turf wars and “mediocre” productivity and should close all 10 field offices and reorganize around its downtown headquarters, an agency task force has recommended.

Consolidating workers downtown who oversee redevelopment projects in North Hollywood, Watts and elsewhere, would “improve overall organizational efficiency and employee productivity,” according to the confidential draft report obtained by The Times.

The report, by seven CRA managers, surfaced on the same day officials tried to assure a Los Angeles City Council panel that the agency’s financial and structural problems are being addressed.

The CRA board, which asked the task force to come up with recommendations, is scheduled to consider the report at its meeting in two weeks, board Chairwoman Peggy Moore said.

Moore said she had not seen all of the recommendations but is open to any idea for making the agency more effective in the face of layoffs and evaporating revenues.

“We’ve asked the agency internally to meet with groups, with UCLA, and come forward with some ideas that they felt we should consider,” Moore said. “We will consider all items.”

But CRA Administrator John Molloy, appointed by Moore’s board, rejected some of the proposals, which were sent Wednesday to management experts at UCLA’s Anderson School of Management for review before being sent to the CRA board for action. Molloy said he might support closing some field offices, but opposes staff consolidation downtown.

“That’s an interesting academic study, but we have no intention of doing that,” Molloy said.

Molloy said the proposals would be considered along with other options. “We’ll take a look at what they come up with and we’ll look at that in conjunction with a hundred other things we’re looking at,” he said.

The dramatic reorganization recommended by the task force quickly emerged as an alternative to one under which the City Council would declare itself the CRA board and consolidate redevelopment functions into a new Economic Development Department. That plan, now before the council, is opposed by the mayor and some CRA officials.

The CRA was created in 1948 to combat blight by using the property tax revenue generated by new development to provide incentives, including street improvements, for additional construction. Its administrative budget is $24 million a year, and it has spent $1.4 billion over its lifetime on dozens of projects, from the Bunker Hill redevelopment to revitalization efforts in South-Central Los Angeles. The redevelopment concept has been criticized in recent years by those who question whether tax money should be used to subsidize private developments.

The CRA task force is headed by Ann Marie Gallant, the agency’s deputy administrator for economic development. The group developed the plan as part of a UCLA training program to help the agency become more effective.

The climate in the CRA “is unhealthy at present,” in part because of the cutbacks and financial problems of the agency, according to the report. “Basically most would agree that morale is low, job frustration is high and productivity mediocre,” according to the report.

In addition to the consolidation, the task force proposed replacing the current hierarchical management structure with one based on self-managed teams.

“The [current] organizational chart encourages regulatory and ‘turf’ wars,” the report said. “The overall good of the organization and its mission is not embraced by all members of the organization.”

The CRA has cut its staff to 210 employeesfrom 350 in the last few years because of revenue cuts caused by a real estate slump, and the agency is trying to close predicted budget deficits of up to $8 million per year during the next five years.

The task force also called for the agency to focus its resources better, choosing projects that generate new jobs and revenue.

A five-year financial strategic plan should be developed to guide the agency into the future, the task force recommended.