The Mayor of L.A., All of It

Mayor James K. Hahn has, in his first months in office, recruited some of the city’s biggest names and deepest pockets to campaign against breaking up Los Angeles. San Fernando Valley secessionists say it’s political suicide for Hahn to oppose their cause. No, leadership is what it is.

After years of having the stage to themselves, secessionists finally face organized and vocal opposition. Even before Hahn announced his L.A. United campaign, a group of Valley residents had organized to fight secession. And the secession process itself has suffered some serious setbacks.

For starters, a consultant hired by the commission planning a referendum on secession proposed a Valley city that would depend on the old Los Angeles for police protection, water, power and all other municipal services--not exactly the independent burg that secessionists had in mind. Then the county counsel joined the city attorney’s office in opining that Los Angeles is under no legal obligation to divide assets with a breakaway city and could, if it chose, make a new city pay for libraries, parks and other facilities.

Secession leaders lashed out at the plan and the legal opinions, saving their harshest words for Hahn. But in habitually attributing roadblocks to city obstructionism, they miss a simple reality: There is no precedent for breaking up a city the size of Los Angeles.

Local Agency Formation commissions--each county has one--are typically asked to oversee the incorporation of a new city from unincorporated land. Such cities tend to be much smaller than a 1.3-million-resident Valley city would be. Recent examples include Orange County’s Rancho Santa Margarita (population 47,000) and Santa Barbara County’s Goleta (30,000). Incorporation of cities that size has much less impact on county government and revenues than Valley secession would have on Los Angeles. In fact, no cities have broken up since tiny Coronado separated from San Diego in 1890 and Montebello briefly joined, then split from, Monterey Park in 1920--hardly models for the Valley.

Few models exist outside of California either, despite secession grumbling from Miami to Quebec. Faux secessions, like the 1987 renaming of part of Canoga Park as West Hills, even though both remained part of Los Angeles, don’t even register.

Valley VOTE, the main secessionist group, wants Los Angeles officials to simply divvy up the city along Mulholland Drive. If it were that easy, examples of how to do it would abound. There are bond obligations, union contracts, court orders regulating everything from police oversight to sewage treatment. Besides, coming up with a blueprint for a new city is not the job of those elected to serve Los Angeles. Safeguarding the city’s interests is.

So is keeping the city together. Hahn was elected by voters on both sides of Mulholland Drive to lead Los Angeles. He’s doing that by working to improve services and making government more accessible to all parts of the city, including the Valley. And he’s doing what the mayor of any great city would do, which is fight to keep that great city whole.