Valley Flexed Its Muscle During 2000

The San Fernando Valley enjoyed heightened political power and visibility in 2000, as state lawmakers crowned the Valley’s first Assembly speaker in a generation, the secession movement dived into the details of municipal breakup, and the first subway cars glided into North Hollywood.

And as the nation wrangled over the presidency, Valley voters decisively punched their ballots for an almost entirely Democratic slate of local lawmakers, tilting the Valley landscape in an ever more liberal direction.

Many of the Valley’s electoral fights were eclipsed this year by a clash of blue-suited titans, Rep. James E. Rogan (R-Glendale) and his challenger, Democratic state Sen. Adam Schiff. It was one of the most expensive House races ever, topping $10 million as the rivals deluged the Glendale-Burbank-Pasadena area with campaign mailers, precinct walkers and phone calls.

The contest attracted interest--and money--from far beyond the borders of the 27th Congressional District. Rogan’s prominent role as one of the House prosecutors during President Clinton’s impeachment trial before the U.S. Senate had earned him the vengeful ire of many liberals who vowed to help unseat him, and an equal measure of unswerving loyalty from conservatives. The contest became a national cause celebre as Democrats fought to reclaim the House.

As the contest heated, the state Democratic and Republican parties and other interest groups shoveled more than $2 million in soft money into the race.

But the district’s Democratic slant left Rogan vulnerable. Despite spending more than $6.4 million to hang onto his job, the Republican incumbent lost by a 9% margin.

“I think what people really want are people who can find common ground, to work together in a bipartisan way,” Schiff said as he prepared to move to a sharply divided Washington. “One of the reasons I was successful in my race is because I emphasized those things.”

Schiff’s congressional victory mirrored the Democratic sweep of most of the Valley’s state legislative seats. The November election ushered several fresh-faced Democrats into the Assembly, including Fran Pavley in the southwest Valley, Carol Liu in the Pasadena region, Dario Frommer in the Glendale-Burbank area, and Paul Koretz in a district that includes Sherman Oaks and Studio City. The lone Republican in the Valley’s delegation--Keith Richman of Northridge--was elected in a district stretching from the northwest Valley into Ventura County.

The year was also marked by the growing political heft of Valley politicians in Sacramento. In January, Assemblyman Bob Hertzberg (D-Sherman Oaks) became the first San Fernando Valley speaker in a quarter of a century. And in November, Democrats Sheila Kuehl and Jack Scott and Republican Tom McClintock all made the leap from the Assembly to the state Senate, adding to the lineup of local heavy hitters in the state Capitol.

Even some freshman lawmakers have snagged leadership posts, thanks to the steady turnover in Sacramento caused by term limits. Richman, for instance, has already been named as Republican Caucus Whip.

Closer to home, meanwhile, half of the Valley’s City Council delegation spent the year revving up for a run for citywide office. Council members Mike Feuer, Laura Chick and Joel Wachs are all angling for new jobs as city attorney, city controller and mayor, respectively.

But future citywide leaders may not find so wide a city to govern.

In 2000, the nitty-gritty work of Valley secession began in earnest as a county commission plunged into a sea of paper. Its task is to study, in detail and with the aid of a $1.4-million consultant, whether the proposed breakup would hurt either side financially.

“The efforts toward self-determination for the Valley have forced the rest of the city to take note,” said Wachs, a 30-year veteran of city politics. “You watch the mayoral candidates--they’re all coming out here now, paying attention to things they’ve never paid attention to before. I think that’s a result of the Valley flexing its political muscle.”

As bureaucrats delved into the assets and liabilities of the proposed Valley city and the rest of Los Angeles, secessionists unveiled a rough blueprint for their dreamed-of metropolis, which would be the country’s sixth-largest city. Valley VOTE, the group leading the secession drive, suggested independent police and fire departments, a full-time mayor and part-time city council--all in the name of healthier government with lower taxes.

On a related front, Gov. Gray Davis signed a law that may eventually pry open the books of groups clamoring for secession. The measure, written by Hertzberg in response to the secrecy shrouding Valley VOTE’s finances, empowers the county commissions that oversee municipal breakups to force secessionists to divulge their donors and expenditures.

But it stops short of requiring disclosure. The panel weighing Valley secession, the Los Angeles County Local Agency Formation Commission, is now considering whether to adopt disclosure requirements. Such rules would probably not apply to petition drives conducted by Valley VOTE and Harbor VOTE, however, because those groups have already filed secession applications.

In any case, the concurrent campaigns for cityhood in the Harbor area and Hollywood may bolster prospects of Valley secession by mobilizing voters in different areas of the city. Voters could be asked to approve or reject these breakup proposals as soon as 2002.

As the Valley’s bid for political independence advanced, a parallel effort to create an autonomous Valley bus system received a setback in 2000. Davis, hoping to hasten the end of a Metropolitan Transportation Authority strike, approved a law that preserves MTA wages and benefits for workers in any new transit zone, such as the bus district proposed for the Valley.

The measure deflated hopes that a Valley zone could operate buses more efficiently and cheaply than the MTA. But earlier this month a consultant studying the plan reported that a tightly managed zone might still save money, reviving the vision of a separate bus system.

For all the Valley’s yearnings for more recognition and control, one long-held dream finally emerged this year from beneath the Santa Monica Mountains. On June 24, the sleek new subway cars of the Metro Red Line finally whooshed into North Hollywood, linking the Valley to downtown Los Angeles through a network of rail tunnels that took eight years and $1.3 billion to build.

It was a triumphant moment for a system hobbled by so many construction problems and cost overruns that exasperated voters approved a 1998 measure that effectively ended new subway projects. The North Hollywood subway extension may well be the last one to see the light in Los Angeles.

But don’t expect Valley drivers to completely abandon their cars. They still want to drive--right up to the rainbow-colored mouth of the shiny new subway. After months of resistance, the MTA backed down and agreed to add hundreds of parking spaces to accommodate the crush of commuters at the North Hollywood station.