L.A. Lacks One Voice in State Capitol

It boasts by far the biggest delegation in town, salted with some of the most powerful lawmakers. It keeps a full-time lobbying team in the state capital.

But for all its size and status, Los Angeles is stumbling in its efforts to press its interests in Sacramento, according to state and local officials. Unlike members of more cohesive delegations from elsewhere in California, legislators from L.A. seldom act as a political bloc and do not meet as a group. No brainstorming sessions over breakfast, no post-recess dinners across from the Capitol at Chops.

Four hundred miles to the south, City Hall provides little guidance on what it wants from the state, lawmakers say.

The budget crisis offers an illustration. In recent weeks, a parade of L.A. officials has swept through the Capitol as the Legislature struggled to close a multibillion-dollar shortfall. They have met with everyone from the governor on down. But they have come with no message other than a plaintive and predictable appeal to spare the city any painful budget cuts, some L.A. lawmakers complain.

“The other jurisdictions do a far better job of impacting decisions that are made on the state level,” said Democratic state Sen. Richard Alarcon, whose district is primarily in Los Angeles. “San Diego does an incredible job. Their smaller caucus is very effective.... San Francisco does an incredible job in getting resources it needs.”

He said Los Angeles is too often silent about tapping state resources for education, affordable housing and programs aimed at curbing poverty.

Mayor James K. Hahn has acknowledged that the city needs to strengthen its profile. He is planning to add one more lobbyist to the city’s two-person team in Sacramento, and earlier this year, he retained two private consultants: the Sacramento firm Aaron Read & Associates and Kam Kuwata, a consultant to Hahn’s mayoral campaign.

“I think we need to beef up our efforts,” Hahn said in an interview. “We care a lot and we’re going to make sure our presence is felt.”

A visit to Sacramento on July 2 by Hahn and a majority of the City Council underscored the flaws in the city’s approach, state lawmakers said. Although it was encouraging to see them make the rounds and eat lunch with legislators, Alarcon said, the L.A. crew had little to say beyond pleading that the city needs help.

“Everybody knows that. There should be a much more detailed and a broader strategic agenda from the city of Los Angeles,” he said.

Assemblyman Mark Ridley-Thomas, a former Los Angeles councilman, said, “It will take more than that one visit -- that one short visit” -- to change things. Ridley-Thomas said that, after he was elected to the Assembly last year, he and the mayor spoke about the need to improve the city’s lobbying efforts in Sacramento.

“He said, ‘This is a good idea. We’re probably missing some opportunities,’ ” Ridley-Thomas said. “Well, yeah!”

Recognizing that state budget cuts could prove crippling for L.A., Hahn has in fact trekked to the state Capitol twice in a recent two-week span. Of the two consultants he has retained, the Read firm is getting $75,000 this year; Kuwata, brought on this spring, is being paid $10,000 a month.

Meanwhile, the Department of Water and Power, which has been relying on the city’s lobbying staff, is taking a new tack. The utility wants to hire a “high-powered” outside firm to advance its agenda when the Legislature takes up energy regulation and other issues, a spokesman said. DWP is taking bids on a lobbying contract capped at $750,000.

“This will supplement our city’s civil service employees,” said Frank Salas, chief administrative officer for DWP. “Big stakes are involved at this point ... and we need to step up the effort.”

Though lawmakers from some smaller cities try to maximize their clout by working together as a delegation, L.A. members seem estranged. Thirty members of the Assembly and Senate, all but five of them Democrats, represent some portion of Los Angeles -- one-quarter of the entire Legislature. Ridley-Thomas said they do not meet regularly as a delegation, talk much on the phone or gather in the Assembly and Senate chambers.

In contrast, lawmakers representing San Diego -- Democrats and Republicans alike -- meet at least one morning a month over orange juice, coffee and eggs to talk about issues important to their city.

“We sometimes feel like a lost sister in San Diego, because L.A. is so big and San Francisco is so powerful,” said Sen. Deirdre Alpert, a San Diego Democrat who arranges the gatherings. “And we feel we need to stand together on regional issues if we expect to make things happen for the region.”

The San Diego lawmakers have used the meetings to stake out common positions on water and transportation. Alpert said she succeeded at one meeting in lining up some Republican support for a bill studying water quality in the San Diego Bay.

Asked why Los Angeles legislators don’t hold such meetings of their own, Alarcon said many are busy enough with committee chairmanships or participation in ethnic, racial or political caucuses.

Ridley-Thomas said City Hall is not making enough of an effort to encourage such informal gatherings or promote a more close-knit L.A. delegation.

L.A. is hardly starved for influential legislators. Assembly Speaker Herb Wesson represents a district that is mostly within the city.

But he is in a delicate spot as Assembly leader, not wanting to stoke a pronounced anti-L.A. sentiment, some lawmakers said.

“Like the 900-pound gorilla, everyone hates L.A.,” said Assemblywoman Jackie Goldberg, a former L.A. city councilwoman. “The speaker’s job is definitely not to promote L.A. The speaker’s job is to promote the agenda of Democrats in the Assembly.”

City Hall foresees better results. Now that two former members of the Assembly, Antonio Villaraigosa and Tony Cardenas, have joined the City Council, city government has a richer understanding of how Sacramento works, some officials said. Cardenas said he anticipates more visits to the Capitol in the coming weeks as the Legislature tries to complete a budget. He said that he believes the field trips pay off and that there were not enough of them when he was in the Assembly.

In a Capitol elevator during the July 2 visit, he said, a former colleague tipped him to the detailed budget cuts later proposed by Assembly Republicans. For a city eager for an edge, such inside information can be invaluable.

“I can honestly say that, when I was a legislator, I certainly felt the lack of that vision or that relationship between L.A. and Sacramento,” said Cardenas, who was elected to the Assembly in 1996 and served three terms.

He said he had told his colleagues that the July 2 trip “was Round 1 in terms of our turning over a new leaf in our relations with Sacramento. When we went up to Sacramento, there was a sigh of relief and comments by legislators saying, ‘Thank you for coming up; we want to see you more; we need to see you more.’ ”