Secession movements may soon change face of Los Angeles area

LOS ANGELES SECESSION AREAS Seven communities
within the City of Los Angeles are considering secession. SOURCE:
State of California Commission on Local Governance for the 21st
Century Original graphic by HARSHA RAO/Daily Bruin Senior Staff Web
adaptation by CHRISTINE TAN

By David Drucker
Daily Bruin Reporter

Welcome to Los Angeles.

Take a look around; if the secession movements that have
organized in disparate parts of the city are successful, you may
not be here much longer.

The San Fernando Valley, Hollywood, and L.A. Harbor are three
out of the seven regions considering seceding from the city.

“The primary reason people want to secede is the desire
for local control,” said Jeff Brain, president of Valley
Voters Organized Towards Empowerment.

Fares Wehbe, President of Hollywood VOTE, echoed Brain’s
sentiments.

“For years, the folks involved in this movement tried to
accomplish things by working with City Hall, but the system is so
bureaucratic that it was simply impossible,” he said.

Secession of these regions would cut L.A.’s 3.6 million
population by more than one-third and significantly reduce its
current 467 square mile area.

According to School of Public Policy professor Eric H.
Monkkonen, an expert in the historical development of cities and
municipal fiscal policy, L.A.’s breakup into smaller entities
would have mixed results.

“Big cities have more clout in certain respects, such as
securing an Olympic Games,” Monkkonen said. “But they
also tend to be less efficient.”

L.A. City Councilwoman Cindy Miscikowski, Chair of the Ad Hoc
Committee on Special Reorganization, the council’s committee
on secession, said L.A. should remain intact.

“Diversity is the most significant reason why I’m
opposed to secession,” said Miscikowski, whose 11th District
includes parts of the Valley and Westwood.

“It would ruin the social demographic value of being a
large urban city,” she said.

California Assemblyman and Speaker Emeritus Antonio
Villaraigosa, D-Los Angeles, an L.A. mayoral candidate and UCLA
alumni, agrees.

“The assemblyman doesn’t support secession,”
said Villaraigosa’s communications director Elena Stern.
“He loves L.A. as it exists today, and appreciates its
diverse makeup.”

In response to this argument, secession proponents are quick to
highlight the heavy support they’ve garnered from
minorities.

“When petitions (for secession) were circulated, we
received over 50 percent support from minority communities like
Pacoima and Sylmar,” Brain said. “In white suburban
communities located along Ventura Blvd., support was in the low
30s.”

Added Harbor VOTE Executive Director William Silverthorn,
“People in L.A.’s inner city will vote for our leaving
because they’ll end up getting more attention as a
result.”

Fueling these secession movements within the nation’s
second-largest metropolis is lingering resentment over
political-footballs-past as well as distribution and management of
L.A.’s $3.6 billion budget.

In practical terms, those concerned want the city to be more
responsive to the 235,000 constituents who reside in each of
L.A.’s 15 council districts and the sometimes contrasting
demands of each district.

“People care how their neighborhoods are
managed,”Silverthorn said. “The L.A. Harbor has one of
the best views in the world, yet it’s filled with more than
it’s fair share of subsidized housing.”

Brain explained that the move for secession dates back to the
1970’s, when then-Mayor Tom Bradley successfully lobbied the
California Legislature to put the decision for secession in the
hands of the L.A. city council, rather than the state.

“Many people feel the city has grown too large, and that
relates to the fairness of taxes paid and the services received for
them,” Brain said. “L.A. received $48 billion for mass
transit and all the Valley got was a stub of a Metro
Rail.”Â 

Wehbe said the effect of the city’s mismanagement also
pushed Hollywood into organizing the petition drive that collected
twice the 25 percent of signatures required by the Local Agency
Formation Commission, the state agency which now regulates the
formation of new cities.

“Hollywood is the most famous city in the world,”
Wehbe said. “But it doesn’t live up to those
expectations, and we feel there are lots of assets that are being
squandered away.”

But Miscikowski pointed out that L.A. has responded to the
concerns of neighborhoods like Venice Beach and Pacific Palisades,
two Westside communities which recently flirted with secession.

“Clearly, we are doing something,” she said.
“Most predominantly we created the Department of Neighborhood
Empowerment, which allows communities to form their own councils
with the power to make recommendations to the city
council.”

Monkkonen said the unique urban character of Los Angeles County,
which includes 88 other independent cities that are home to 6.4
million people, has contributed in part to the desire of many L.A.
residents to secede

“All people have to do is look around and see the
performance of smaller cities,” Monkkonen said. “They
haven’t sunk, and it’s clear to most that these city
governments satisfy their residents.”

“Much of what big cities do is small potato stuff, like
filling potholes, which can be handled just as easily by a small
city. Then again, large cities have the revenue to afford things
like special police investigation units,” he added.

But a proposed Valley city, with a population of 1.4 million
people, would hardly qualify as a small city.

And Brain insisted that the issue revolves around the need for
local control.

“What we need in the Valley is not necessarily what they
need in other parts of the city,” Brain said.