A Savvy Referee for L.A.’s Secession Wars

If voters are asked to decide, perhaps this November, whether to break Los Angeles into as many as four smaller cities, they won’t see Zev Yaroslavsky’s name on the ballot.

But the powerful county supervisor, a fixture in Los Angeles politics since the presidency of Gerald Ford, has left his fingerprints all over the secession proposals for the San Fernando Valley, Hollywood and the harbor area.

As chairman of a little-known subcommittee of a state agency with the power to take secession to the voters, Yaroslavsky became the equivalent of the referee while city officials and secessionists wrestled over precise terms of the breakup. Many of the stickiest issues--how to divvy up such assets as police stations, for example, or what utility rates Los Angeles might charge the breakaway cities--landed squarely at his feet.

He was sometimes gruff, accusing the city of trying to “torpedo” the proposals or comparing turf-hungry Los Angeles bureaucrats to lions gnawing on a slab of red meat. He was often in a hurry. And time after time, Yaroslavsky came down on the side of what he called common sense, using “gut checks” and “smell tests” to feel his way through a swamp of competing interests and to look for compromises.

“I’m just calling them as I see them, trying to be fair and logical and equitable,” said Yaroslavsky, who has remained publicly neutral on secession.

Experience, Position Make for Ideal Arbiter

In many ways, the mustachioed politician, whom the late City Council President John Ferraro called “master of the sound bite,” is a natural choice to arbitrate what could be one of the biggest political upsets in Los Angeles history if the secession drives succeed. As a county official, Yaroslavsky has a far smaller stake in the outcome than do City Hall leaders. Yet, after almost 20 years as a Los Angeles councilman, he knows city government better than most anyone.

He’s especially savvy when it comes to the city budget--a source of fierce tussling in the secession tug of war--because he spent 11 years running the council’s influential Budget Committee.

Now, as one of nine members of the Local Agency Formation Commission, a state-created panel whose hottest decisions generally involve sewer district annexations, Yaroslavsky will help decide whether to put the breakaway proposals on the Nov. 5 ballot. It was a position he sought, appointing himself to the LAFCO board five years ago when he headed the Board of Supervisors. He said he wanted to be part of the action when the secession campaigns revved up.

Yaroslavsky took on an even more vigorous role last fall when LAFCO Chairman Henri Pellissier asked him to lead a four-person subcommittee to help craft secession packages that could go before voters. It was a complex, fast-paced job that required Yaroslavsky to spur city leaders and secessionists to agree on three proposals in a matter of a few months.

“He’s been harsh on both sides,” said Ron Deaton, the city’s chief legislative analyst and a lead negotiator for Los Angeles in the secession debates. “I think what he’s trying to do, whether it is successful or not, is to give both sides enough pain to have them feel obliged to negotiate between themselves to come to some agreement, so that he doesn’t have to make a decision.

“Other than that,” Deaton added with a wink as Yaroslavsky walked by, “he’s a miserable SOB.”

It’s a playful jibe that elicits only a wry smile from Yaroslavsky, who has made a career of taking on powerful forces including the Los Angeles Police Department, commercial developers, oil magnates and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Like the secessionists, he was once the underdog too, a mop-haired Hebrew teacher who shook up the political establishment by winning a seat on the Los Angeles City Council at 26.

Over the years, some of Yaroslavsky’s actions have helped smooth the path for secessionists. In 1998, at his behest, the Board of Supervisors doubled the length of time allotted to Valley secession leaders to collect the 135,000 signatures needed to trigger a study of cityhood’s feasibility. Yaroslavsky, who represents the Westside and much of the Valley, also pushed for public funding to verify the signatures and conduct the studies rather than imposing hefty costs on secession proponents.

More recently, Yaroslavsky’s LAFCO panel aligned itself with secession leaders on a number of key issues. The subcommittee rejected the city’s argument that it would be stuck with more than $300 million a year in costs if the Valley secedes, instead recommending that the Valley pay Los Angeles $36.6 million in annual “alimony.”

Not surprisingly, that pleased secession advocates, who generally give him high marks for fairness.

“Because of his unique knowledge of city government, he’s been able to see through the voodoo economics of the city,” said Richard Close, a longtime leader of Sherman Oaks homeowners who heads the secession group Valley VOTE. “He’s able to see what’s a real concern and what is a fabricated concern.”

Yaroslavsky’s panel also said parks, fire stations, Van Nuys Airport and other Valley assets should be transferred to the new city at no cost. That recommendation defied advice from LAFCO’s legal counsel.

But it was simply, Yaroslavsky said, a matter of common sense.

“Valley taxpayers have paid plenty of taxes,” he said. “If you’re going to say that a Valley police station doesn’t belong to the Valley because the Valley hasn’t paid as much [tax] over the years as the city has, then you have to deduct what the Valley taxpayers have paid for city police stations.... And rather than go through that accounting nightmare, let’s just stipulate that if it’s in the Valley, it belongs to the Valley. If it’s in the city, it belongs to the city. Period, over and out.”

City negotiators eventually agreed to the asset split, provided the Valley also share the liabilities.

The LAFCO subcommittee hasn’t always agreed with secessionists. The panel decided against splitting up the city’s Department of Water and Power, saying it was working well. It also recommended that the sewer system remain whole but said--in a victory for secession backers--that the city should not be allowed to charge higher utility rates for service in breakaway areas. Yaroslavsky’s panel also turned down Valley VOTE’s request for a 10-year limit on the Valley’s alimony payment. It recommended a 20-year period during which payments would gradually decrease.

Despite the concessions to both sides, some Los Angeles leaders voiced concern about the panel’s fairness and attention to detail.

City Councilwoman Cindy Miscikowski, a LAFCO board member who opposes secession, said she was troubled that the subcommittee “overruled” its own lawyer in recommending an asset split.

“They are not taking into consideration rather basic concerns,” she said. She noted, for example, the panel decided that if secession succeeds, the breakaway cities should become independent on Jan. 1, 2003, even though Los Angeles sought a midyear split to simplify accounting and gain time to negotiate service contracts.

“I get the impression that [Yaroslavsky] just wants to get through it,” said Miscikowski, whose Westside district extends into the Valley. “He’s just sort of bulldozing through it. And all I would ask is that they have a sound analysis of the issues.”

Another city official close to the negotiations said Yaroslavsky sometimes appeared frustrated, even “surly.”

But the blunt-spoken supervisor, who has branded positions taken by various camps in the debate as “nonsense,” “usurious,” “ridiculous,” “bogus,” “fictional” and “obstructionist,” made no apologies for nudging the process along.

“My purpose is, first of all, to light a fire under both sides, to get off their collective derrieres and move,” Yaroslavsky said. “Because we don’t have time. If we want to get this on [the ballot] in November, time’s a-wasting.”

State Deals a Blow to Harbor Secessionists

The panel’s recommendations for the harbor area and Hollywood largely mirror those for the Valley. Questions still loom about the fiscal viability of a harbor city, however.

The state Lands Commission dealt the harbor a significant setback Tuesday by excluding tidelands around the Port of Los Angeles from the proposed city’s borders, denying it millions in revenue.

Politically, Yaroslavsky’s base will probably remain secure no matter what becomes of the breakaway bids.

He was reelected in March with no opposition. Among his hundreds of campaign contributors were people on both sides of the secession fight, including two prominent backers of Valley cityhood, car dealer Bert Boeckmann and attorney David Fleming, as well as secession opponent Miscikowski.

The subcommittee’s reports now go to the full LAFCO commission. Some terms may yet change, as negotiations continue between Los Angeles and the secession leaders. But on April 17, LAFCO Executive Director Larry Calemine is expected to present his final report on Valley secession, followed by reports on the harbor and Hollywood in May.

Then LAFCO must decide whether to put the secession question to voters citywide. To win independence, the breakaway regions need majority support not just from voters in their respective areas, but citywide.

“Everybody’s going to come to their own conclusion,” Yaroslavsky said. “They’re not going to be sitting around the kitchen table the weekend before the election saying, ‘You know, honey, we didn’t get the North Hollywood police station.’ They’re not going to get into that.

“At the end of the day, this is a political decision for the people of the city,” he said. “And our job has been to make sure that all parties are protected against unintended consequences.”