CommentsTHE CITY-It looks like another election season will come and go while the neighborhood councils remain essentially spectators. But it doesn’t have to be that way.
During the design of the neighborhood council system, the drafters hoped that the volunteer board members would go beyond addressing local issues, and also devote a small amount of time to fundamentally changing the way government functions … hopefully bringing it closer to the people.
Since they were created, the councils have engaged in some successful citywide efforts. The first was reducing the size of a proposed water rate hike.
But each of these campaigns have been in response to something onerous that City Hall has tried to do. The councils have never gotten to the point of developing an organization that is ready, willing, and able to proactively develop new programs or laws.
The neighborhood council system collectively has nearly unlimited power to reshape government because of the number of people and voters it can mobilize.
ne of the attitudes that has blocked the use of this power exists among too many neighborhood council members who fear antagonizing the elected officials if they raise their voices too loudly.
It’s a false fear. Government employee unions exert significant influence in the political arena. Yet, when locked in contract dispute, for example, vicious personal attacks can be the order of the day. Once an agreement is reached, everyone is friends again.
Politicians understand that this is the way the game is played. They respect and fear the power of the unions to affect public opinion and future elections.
There’s an old saying that neighborhood councils need to learn: You can’t negotiate from a position of weakness.
And there are some neighborhood council members who believe that the City Council needs to give the councils more power to do this, that, or the other thing.
There’s another saying: Power that is given is power that can be taken away.
A good example can be found in the Brazilian city of Porto Allegre.
After military rule in Brazil ended, and a new constitution was adopted in 1988, democracy was off and running.
The mayor of Porto Alegre (pop. 1.4 million) inherited a budget that allocated 98% of its revenue for salaries, leaving crumbs with which to improve a dilapidated infrastructure and school system.
A system of neighborhood councils was created, and they were given the ability to designate, subject to what became a government rubber stamp, the city’s entire capital improvements budget.
The program became so popular that it kept in power for 16 years the party that initiated the system. In 2004, an opposition party won the election, but it wisely decided to embrace the participatory budget process.
This “popular administration” program was selected by the United Nations in 1996 as one of the top 40 urban innovations in the world.
In Porto Alegre, the public identifies the specific projects, plans investments, reviews payrolls, monitors projects, and holds the mayor accountable for results.
The public even accepted a tax increase on the middle-class because the public felt it had control over how its money would be spent.
Porto Alegre’s government doesn’t impose the rules of the neighborhood council system. It is entirely self-regulated.
An economist who worked with a former mayor said that the principle of self-regulation is fundamental. “If we had wanted to prepare this [plan] in the municipal chamber,” he said, “we would not have a participatory budget because the councilmen would try to regulate it to such a degree that the autonomy of the people would disappear ….”
He explained that at one point, councilmen from the opposition party tried to write the system into law “so that they could gain control of it and stop it.” The idea failed because the people of Porto Alegre were tired of being at the mercy of the government.
An aide to a former mayor explained that to want public participation to be disciplined and measured is the same as not wanting any participation at all.
He said that the participatory budget process “might seem to be chaotic and disorderly because apparently there is no organization, but that is its strength. People go there to tell us what they need, to petition the mayor or the technicians, and get upset. That is the process.”
This is an important point about participatory democracy that has always been lost on the Los Angeles City Council who are always trying to impose new rules and restrictions when the neighborhood council members get too loud, demanding, or disorderly.
Assuming that someone will emerge to lead this army of activists and reformers, the first step should be to identify a few changes that all, or nearly all, neighborhood councils can agree upon.
My suggestions are these:
Don’t start with divisive or complex issues regardless of how important they be. You need a win.
If your first move is to plead with the City Council or mayor to take a certain action, they may not believe that you have the muscle to back it up. So, you may want to begin by firing a bold shot across the bow to get City Hall’s attention.
I can’t remember if there was ever a time when a citizens’ initiative was qualified for the ballot. It’s not an easy process, but with organization, the neighborhood councils could do it.
I would pick a City Charter amendment that is simple to write and understand, and that would generate widespread voter support by its title alone.
The ideal subject should be one that would allow you to deliver a simple message, but require the opponents to prepare complex responses.
One possibility would be to change the way the salaries and perks of city elected officials are determined, and maybe even reduce them. The city council members are easily the highest paid in the nation, and no other city council members have staff budgets anywhere near the size they are in Los Angeles.
If the neighborhood councils could qualify any City Charter amendment for the ballot, they would immediately establish themselves as the most influential force in the city. The real threat of taking another charter amendment to the ballot would always be there.
Placing a charter amendment on the ballot requires collecting 269,600 signatures of voters in 180 days.
To accomplish this, the army would have to be in place and trained before the clock started running so that no time is wasted.
Blank petitions contain room for 40 signatures. If each of the nearly 2,000 neighborhood council board members took the responsibility to fill one petition (it takes a few hours) every month for four months, 320,000 signatures could be collected well before the deadline.
And that doesn’t account for participation from friends and relatives of the board members, and from the members of other community organizations, such as residents associations.
And qualifying an ordinance for the ballot requires only 61,486 signatures.
There is an opportunity for neighborhood councils to stop playing the victim card, and start running government.
(Greg Nelson is a former general manager of the Department of Neighborhood Empowerment, was instrumental in the creation of the LA Neighborhood Council System, served as chief of staff for former LA City Councilman Joel Wachs … and occasionally writes for CityWatch. He can be reached at [email protected].)
-cw
CityWatch
Vol 13 Issue 16
Pub: Feb 24, 2015
Neighborhood Councils Could Drive this Crazy Train … IF They Wanted To
