Be Brave, Mr. Mayor

ALPERN ON POLITICS-There are some of those who read, and/or who write for, CityWatch who will never forgive or forget this Mayor's past and ongoing problems, and/or his political choices that have ongoing consequences in the economic and infrastructure woes in the City of the Angels.  Yet there is only one elected Mayor--one Eric Garcetti--and in these troubled times we can only succeed if he shows leadership. 

That means real leadership.  That means real courage.  Bravery.  Moxie.  Spine.  Backbone. 

 And...Vision!

At this point, I'm already presuming that some of you readers are ready to click on to the next silly voice that portends to have an answer or two for our local woes.  So here's a hunk of red meat for all you Downtown/City Council/Mayor Garcetti haters, as the Mayor begins fundraising for his re-election bid: 

Mr. Mayor, unfunded mandates do not show courage, vision, or any form of leadership that this City needs. 

Mandating earthquake retrofitting does not show courage, vision or leadership.  Ditto for mandating an elevated minimum wage.  Ditto for calling for Los Angeles to be more business-friendly, or for calling for balancing the City budget. 

Talk is cheap.  Whiskey costs money.  Saying we need to do these gigantic endeavors is akin to wishing us all long lives, health and wealth--it doesn't do much, and we're living in a City with an electorate that virtually has thrown up its hands in despair and given up on City government as hopelessly corrupt, bought off, and incompetent. 

My own neighborhood council, the Mar Vista Community Council, is caught up in issues involving past and present decisions involving traffic, expenditure of school funds, and earthquake retrofitting for apartments which must be paid for by the renters, owners, or both.  I've seen and heard from my constituents, and they're seething with rage.   

Rightfully so, in my opinion.  Although a bright spot came in the form of Councilmember Mike Bonin's leadership in getting the City to repave a vital alley to serve the commercial corridor of Venice Blvd.

Unfortunately , we don't live in a society where political leaders (such as the Mayor) can apologize and offer to change course--we have a society where one's political enemies seize on that apology and demand one's resignation.   

Apologies are for "losers", so the opportunity for the Mayor to say, "Sorry about the past decisions about overdevelopment, poor Planning decisions, boxing out the electorate, and creating a pension/budget crisis when I was on the City Council" doesn't exist for Eric Garcetti. 

We'll just to read between the lines, and see what the Mayor does.  To his credit, he doesn't throw all of the blame at his predecessor, and has had considerable outreach (whether for show or actual results it's hard to know at this time) to those constituents still hopeful and/or gullible enough to think they can still make a difference: 

1) In my last CityWatch article, I raised the horrific choice taxpayers have to make:  to not pay for the broken-down infrastructure we already paid for (good streets, sidewalks, schools, parks, sewage/water pipes, etc., some of which is NOT under Mayoral control), or to grit out collective teeth and pay for it a second time. 

I also raised the horrific conclusion that the Illinois Supreme Court made for a cash-strapped state which tried to slash retirement benefits to confront a massive budget deficit.  The Supreme Court rightfully declared that a legal promise is a promise that cannot be reversed. 

This is not to say that the Illinois Legislature can't start creating a new "windfall pension tax" to start taxing higher-income pensioners, but it's an ugly reminder of what happens when we ("we" being the City of Los Angeles or the State of California) put ourselves into a budgetary hell of paying more for retired employees than for current employees, and watch our precious infrastructure funds get spent...somewhere ELSE. 

The Mayor needs to articulate and address this nightmare, and--as with earthquake retrofitting--demand shared sacrifice from all parties.  Someone needs to say what the people want to hear:  the City misspent its public funds, and is on course to correcting this misspending through brave and visionary measures. 

2) To some degree, the political choice for the Mayor is obvious.  The LAPD, LAFD and first-responders are the most glaringly-underfunded parts of the City workforce, and the LADWP is glaringly out of control. 

As Steve Lopez describes so very well, the LADWP is rife with corruption, misspending, questionable if not inaccurate (perhaps illegal) charging of its constituents for water/power costs, and "owning" City Hall via brazen methods that continue to this day. 

The obvious "Darth Vader" of all this is Brian D'Arcy, the "big boss" who has played this City well, and it's quite evident that after Mayor Garcetti got elected over Wendy Greuel because she gave in to the LADWP, it's up to the Mayor to stand up to "Darth D'Arcy" NOW, and not just for election/re-election time show. 

Yes, the LADWP gives its ratepayer overruns to the City to help balance its budget (which is probably an illegal fiscal arrangement), but when our sewage and water pipes have a new break each day, and all sorts of hands are being thrust in front of the taxpayers to pay for updating our infrastructure, it's hard not to conclude that the taxpayers are being milked and bilked...again. 

Because rates are taxes, and the taxpayers are watching their lives get destroyed while the LADWP continues to be overpaid and underpoliced. 

3) So will the Mayor really do the brave thing NOW, or when it is politically expedient in about a year or two when re-election time comes? 

A very simple way for the Mayor to do the brave thing is to let the Budget Advocates (citizen volunteers, usually from the Neighborhood Councils) be present at all negotiations with the LADWP and/or other public sector unions.  Implementing much of what the Budget Advocates recommend is also politically expedient, and perhaps Charter Reform to require evening meetings on budgetary and Planning issues is also indicated. 

Either way, if the Mayor wants another Measure R to be passed, then the need to use it to pay for much of the past sidewalk and road repairs the City failed to fund over the last 15-20 years, will get the job done. 

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Demanding either a five-year pay freeze for LADWP employees, or a 5% (or more) salary cut for LADWP employees, is also a way for the Mayor to be brave while demanding City taxpayers and ratepayers cough up more money for decades-overdue infrastructure repairs as our pipes fall apart each day. 

Cutting off City business funds for transportation away from the General Fund, and offer tax credits to repair our alleys and commercial thoroughfares instead, means reduced City revenue while shoring up our infrastructure with endeavors that the City's businesses actually want to pay for. 

This takes bravery.  Courage.  Moxie.  Spine.  Backbone.  And...Vision! 

We've already had one Mayor with high hopes turn into low returns...leaving our current Mayor, Eric Garcetti with a heckuva problem list to correct. 

So the big question is this:  do we have to wait 1-2 years for a brave leader for the City of the Angeles...or can we have that sort of bravery right now? 

(Ken Alpern is a Westside Village Zone Director and Board member of the Mar Vista Community Council (MVCC), previously co-chaired its Planning and Outreach Committees, and currently is Co-Chair of its MVCC Transportation/Infrastructure Committee. He is co-chair of the CD11Transportation Advisory Committee and chairs the  nonprofit Transit Coalition, and can be reached at [email protected]  He also does regular commentary on the Mark Isler Radio Show on AM 870, and co-chairs the grassroots Friends of the Green Line at www.fogl.us. The views expressed in this article are solely those of Mr. Alpern.) 

-cw

 

 

CityWatch

Vol 13 Issue 41

Pub: May 19, 2015