L.A. Councilmember Paul Krekorian's First 100 Days in Office

We do this interview on the 100th day of your tenure on the L.A. City Council. What opportunities and challenges come with election to the L.A. City Council?

My first 100 days have been marked by jumping into the fray of a budget crisis at the same time that I faced natural disasters and tragic crime impacting my district, and a DWP-proposed rate increase that would have been devastating for small businesses and homeowners in my district. It has been a lot to take on in a short amount of time. But we have made a significant impact already.

We have provided an unparalleled level of constituent service. We have increased transparency and accountability in government in the way we operate our offices and interact with our constituents. We have developed new communication strategies with our constituents, both among the business community and individuals, including the development of an iPhone application, a new website, and new technologies to communicate with constituents and allow them to communicate with us. We have stood up and fought for public safety at a time when it has been under attack. We have used some of the policy experience that I developed in Sacramento on renewable energy, jobs development, environmental protection, and many other areas to help to shape the policy agenda in my first 100 days. I expect to continue to.

One of the most visible and contentious issues arising in your first 100 days has been the mayor's proposed electricity rate increases for the DWP. The council, mayor, and DWP have publicly challenged each other about policy and facts. Share how a councilmember with 100 days of experience on the job contributes in a material way to such a debate.

Before I was in public service I was a business litigation attorney. In that world there are burdens of proof that have to be made. I hold a high standard for factual justification of policy changes, especially policy changes that have tremendous negative impact on my constituents and on the businesses and individual residents of Los Angeles. I, as one councilmember, expected that the DWP would justify any rate increase proposal by meeting a fairly high level burden of proof. They failed to do that. The justifications that were presented relating to the cost of renewable energy were inadequate, and I have a fair degree of experience in renewable energy policy from my time as chair of the Select Committee on Renewable Energy at the California State Assembly. I understood and questioned the assumptions made about renewable energy. What I have seen presented by the DWP so far is completely inadequate to lead to the conclusion that a rate increase would be necessary to meet our carbon reduction goals. We have yet to receive an integrated resources plan, for example. We don't know yet whether the DWP's renewable energy plans will even produce a net reduction in carbon. We don't know yet how renewable will be integrated into non-renewable resources so we have a reliable source of electricity. Until those questions are answered and that kind of information is provided, I certainly can't justify a rate increase to meet renewable energy goals.

They also asserted that the rate increase would be necessary because of the risk of a credit downgrade-because of cash flow purposes-but they are sitting on $1 billion in cash reserves. They have proposed a $5.1 billion capital investment plan and haven't justified to me why that needs to be initiated now, enough to require an increase in the fiscal quarter. I remain unconvinced. More broadly than that, the process by which these proposals have been presented has been a model of a lack of transparency, lack of input, inadequate stakeholder involvement, and, I think, arrogance on the part of the DWP.

What explains the absence of transparency and stakeholder involvement in both last year's Measure B campaign for a charter change to give DWP absolute authority over renewables and this spring's proposed electricity rate increases?

If there is a good case to be made as to why the DWP must have a rate increase, that case must be made to the public in an open, transparent way. The fact that neighborhood councils have not been engaged in this process, that hearings by the commission have been done with minimal notice or on an emergency basis, and that the proposals presented by the DWP have been at variance with the recommendations that PA Consulting developed over the course of nine months, all suggest to me that there is a distinct lack of transparency. That alone should be enough to reject that policy.

Let's turn to your membership on the City Council's Jobs and Economic Development Committee. There is double-digit unemployment in L.A. What are the city's thoughts about how to turn this situation around?

There is no one answer to what the city's thoughts are about that, but speaking for myself I want to focus my efforts on continuing to develop and encourage film and television production jobs, building on the success that I had in Sacramento in offering the first film and television tax incentive in the state's history-a half billion dollar tax incentive program that is already having tremendous impact in bringing production jobs back to California. I want to continue to build on that success, along with Chairman Richard Alarcón, who has also had a number of excellent proposals in this area, to try to make Los Angeles a more film-friendly city.

We need to do much more to relieve the regulatory and tax burden, especially on small businesses located in Los Angeles. We aren't competitive with surrounding cities, especially in this time of economic and fiscal crisis. We need to bring jobs back to Los Angeles, which will increase the revenue available to the city. We need to have a longer-term vision for job development. I have focused, in my district, on trying to develop that kind of a vision through the selection of a Jobs and Economic Development Advisory Committee that will help to develop stakeholder input and advise me on steps to be more proactive in attracting jobs and eliminating the kind of unnecessary red tape and aggravating bureaucratic barriers that drive businesses away.

That relates to planning and land use. An example would be the I-5 corridor in the northern part of my district, which is currently being under-utilized, with auto dismantlers and waste businesses, when it has great potential to be a magnet for industrial activity and high tech industries because of its proximity to transportation and close availability to universities. There are studies about the renaissance of the I-5 corridor in the Sun Valley area, but they are sitting on shelves. It is time we start to act to create that kind of economic rebirth in some of these under-utilized areas.

Are the city of L.A.'s present land use tools, in terms of powers and authority, adequate to attract the kind of investment, business and jobs that you are seeking?

The council office has a number of tools available. We have been very effective in working with city departments to respond to concerns of businesses in our district about inappropriate bureaucratic barriers, which we have helped to eliminate. With land use issues, we have done an effective job of ensuring that development in the district meets the needs of the community, is consistent with the character of the different neighborhoods in the district, and promotes the kind of economic activity that we want in the area.

You also serve on the Council's Planning and Land Use Management Committee, doing so at a time when the Planning Department's budget is being cut and staff is being transferred and furloughed. Given the aforementioned, what is the city's capacity to execute any project?

Virtually every area of city services has been impacted by the current budget constraints. The Planning Department has been especially eviscerated through the Early Retirement Incentive Program (ERIP) and the threat of additional layoffs and funding cuts. It is especially difficult to ask Planning Department staff to develop a robust vision for the city of L.A. Until the economy and revenues recover, it is going to be difficult for us to engage in the development of the consensus vision we need, because we are struggling right now to maintain the core services that a city has to provide to continue to function. I am hopeful that the economic trends will improve and we will turn the corner sooner rather than later, but for the shorter term we have a tremendous challenge just in ensuring that we continue to deliver police and fire services, basic street maintenance, and parks and libraries. It is going to be a challenge to ask our planning staff to take on new responsibilities.

The region's elected officials have been working feverishly to secure federal approval for a 30-10 funding program to accelerate the build out of L.A.'s transit system. Some observers are fearful that there is no capacity to actually execute if officials are successful in getting 30-10 approved. Is that your concern as well?

It is always a great frustration when you have exactly the kind of opportunity that we need to take advantage of to create economic stimulus, to put people back to work, and to begin to increase revenues, and we are left inadequately able to take advantage of those opportunities because we are making short-term cuts. It was something we experienced at the state level all the time. Short-term budget cuts caused us to potentially sacrifice significant amounts of matching federal funds, for example. That is one of the reasons, in fact, that as we have gone through this budget balancing process and the council has sometimes been faced with making decisions about the number of layoffs for city employees-1,000 or 4,000, the number has varied quite a lot. One of my biggest concerns is that we haven't adequately considered the impact on not just immediate service but our ability to take advantage of revenue generation opportunities and those economic stimulus opportunities that you described.

Do you foresee a bankruptcy in the next two years, as former Mayor Riordan suggested?

That has to be the last resort. While some would suggest that bankruptcy should be used as a vehicle in the way corporate America might-to aggregate our contracts and start fresh-they may not fully appreciate the long-term, devastating damage that would do fiscally and to the spirit of this city. At the same time, the magnitude of the problem that we face, and the magnitude of the global recession, is such that it is an option that we can never take off the table. But it has to be the last option.

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ERIP, which was done before your time and tries to save existing jobs by incentivizing people to retire early on a high pension, was celebrated in City Hall but scorned outside of City Hall. You come in with the benefit of hindsight; what are your thoughts? Should ERIP have been celebrated?

I don't want to use the benefit of hindsight to second-guess policy makers who were facing the issues that they were at the time. But I will say that ERIP has had a very negative impact on the city's ability to be managed right now. Some of our most talented, most experienced managers are either already gone or about to leave. It has really exacerbated the problems that we are facing in trying to navigate our way through the most difficult of times. At the same time, by being, perhaps, too slow in implementing that policy, we are also not deriving its full benefit because the savings are not being realized yet. We are losing the ability to have forward-looking management of departments, and we are still not realizing enough savings to prevent dramatic cuts to personnel and budgets. The policy hasn't succeeded in the way it was intended to.

You are on the Education and Neighborhoods Committee. You served on a school board before going to the State Assembly. NPR recently had a story on the Lawndale Environmental Charter High School, which is an environmental school where the kids are involved in greening the school and is now a national model and may be the host for a speech by President Obama. Is there a relationship between LAUSD and the City Council that you can take advantage of in your committee work to realize those kinds of programs, with $8 billion still to be spent in school bonds?

There is a tremendous opportunity for improvement in the collaboration between the city and school district. I have had conversations with school board members already about that. It will be one of my priorities in a variety of areas. We could do a much better job of joint use of facilities between the city and the school district, which would realize cost efficiencies for both agencies while maximizing the utilization of tax-payer-funded facilities. Joint purchasing can realize cost efficiencies, and there are other ways to work collaboratively to realize budget savings for the school district and the city. The relationship between DWP and the school district needs to be improved so we can take advantage of all the great opportunities that schools present as efficient users of electricity and water, to be models of renewable energy use, and so forth, which will allow the school district to benefit by saving money in their general fund to put money into the classroom. That is a strategy that we used very effectively when I served the school district in Burbank, for example. We should cooperate better in public safety. The fact that we don't have a stronger relationship in addressing the gang problem between the school district and the city is a real missed opportunity, especially as budgets are being cut in prevention areas. That's all the more reason that we have to work in a collaborative way.

There is a discussion of consolidation of some departments because of the fiscal constraints. In Redlands some years ago they put Rec and Parks under the Police Department with the idea that the Police Department had obligations to be proactive, not just suppressive. Is that a concept that makes sense for Los Angeles?

We have to find ways to streamline government, consolidate management of government, and to realize savings and efficiencies that way. I don't know if I am prepared to say that I would consolidate the Police Department and Rec and Parks, but I will say that there is a direct linkage there. One of the challenges we face in addressing the budget is that two-thirds of our budget is spent on public safety. No one wants to cut public safety, but that means that 100 percent of our budget cuts need to fall on about one-third of the budget. What people too often lose sight of is that when we close parks and libraries or take programming away from those services, it makes the job that the police face significantly harder. It makes the need for police services significantly greater because, not just in the short term, but for the next generation, we are going to increase the level of crime by decreasing the number of opportunities that youth have available to them.

You have tremendous credentials as part of the Democratic leadership of the legislature and great relationships with labor, but the perception of the public through this fiscal crisis has been that public sector labor is driving the agenda to the detriment of services to the general public. Is that unfair?

It is somewhat unfair, because in my conversations with leaders of the public employee unions there has been a uniform expression of willingness to figure out a way forward, cooperatively. There is a clear understanding on the part of every one of the unions that the city faces a real, undeniable crisis. My discussions with them indicate that they are prepared to make sacrifices necessary to avert that crisis and to make sure that the city can continue to function. What we have been lacking is a process by which to bring all of those parties together around a common solution. I am still, frankly, struggling to figure out how we get to that common solution. There is willingness on the part of the unions. I know that on the part of the council there is an understanding that we need to make cuts; we need to make dramatic cuts. We won't have many other options to avoid ultimate insolvency if we don't take aggressive actions.

You began your answer earlier by saying it is difficult to get one answer out of the city. Who speaks for the city on economic development, and what tools help councilmembers and their offices encourage investment and growth in small business?

The council has tried to address some of the barriers to businesses staying in Los Angeles. A recent example was the action that we took to modify the tax treatment that internet businesses in Los Angeles were facing, which would have caused dramatic increases in their business tax rate and clearly would have pushed them out of Los Angeles. The council took action to fix that. The mayor has now appointed Mr. Beutner to lead the jobs development effort in the Mayor's Office, and I am looking forward to working with him to find additional ways for the council and the mayor to work collaboratively to focus on growing new businesses.