Editorial: Tired of City Hall scandals? This is the moment to reform Los Angeles city government
It’s hard to believe it, but we’ve reached the midway point of the 2015-2016 City Council session.
As of today, Council members have made significant progress on a variety of issues, and there’s been renewed momentum behind passing a new charter that would give residents more power over the way their city operates.
The “L.A. 21,” as it was originally known, was first introduced in 2013 and then amended in 2015 after a long battle between the “no” and “yes” camps.
It was designed as an attempt to deal with what’s now one of the most critical issues facing Los Angeles: the corruption, cronyism and lack of transparency that now pervades the entire city bureaucracy.
It was also an attempt to deal with the fact that we haven’t had a fully functioning mayor in decades, which means our elected officials really are in charge of city government. That’s a reality, and it’s one that Los Angeles voters need to acknowledge and deal with.
If not, it’s not going to get any better.
It’s time for council members to act on their promise and reform the way our city city functions. It’s time for transparency and accountability. It’s time to move away from scandal and towards a system that works.
The L.A. Times ran an article on Tuesday, “City Council to Vote on Charter Changes” on a series by city columnist Andrew Vanacore. In the column, Vanacore wrote:
“The Council could agree Monday to change the way the city government operates and make public a draft of the proposed charter, the latest step in a long fight to end corruption and improve the workings of city government