Measure G’s revamp of the Los Angeles County charter is generally discussed in terms of its two marquee changes: It requires an independently elected county executive beginning in 2028, and a nine-member Board of Supervisors to replace the current five-member board beginning in 2032.
But Measure G mandates new support positions as well, including a “nonpartisan” county legislative analyst and a director of budget and management.
The county’s Governance Reform Task Force set a series of August meetings to hammer out details of the three new positions and vote on a package of recommendations to send to the Board of Supervisors by Sept. 9 (spoiler alert: they missed their deadline).
In an Aug. 21 presentation to the Task Force, political science Prof. Timothy Krebs of the University of New Mexico noted that in U.S. political systems with directly elected executives, “there is the potential for executive dominance” – because the executive has access to information and resources that legislative branches lack.
For a system with co-equal branches, separation of powers and checks and balances to work properly, the legislative branch needs resources to counter that dominance.
That’s the reason for a strong legislative analyst.
Prof. Timothy Krebs tells the Task Force that elected executives often dominate their legislative counterparts, and that the imbalance can be at least partially corrected by a legislative analyst's office. (GRTF meeting video)
As with most ballot measures in California, Measure G came before voters in two different pieces, the first being a frustrating and not very informative tautological single-sentence question – in essence, Shall the ballot measure to do X, Y and Z be adopted? – and the second, in a different part of the pamphlet or another booklet altogether, a lengthy and almost unreadable recitation of each proposed charter amendment in full.
Voters often see only the first part and unknowingly adopt things they haven’t read in the second part. Those back-page details aren’t tricks (usually). There’s simply no room to squeeze everything into a readable ballot question.
The basic Measure G question asked voters if they wanted to establish a “nonpartisan Legislative Analyst to review proposed County policies.” Would that person be reporting to the new executive, or to the Board of Supervisors? The ballot question – the first and most widely read part – leaves things unclear.
But the more detailed charter amendment lays it out more plainly: “The Board of Supervisors through its County Legislative Analyst shall receive nonpartisan legislative support and analysis on County policy issues.” The CLA will work for the board and be one of the few county offices not accountable to the executive.
By the way, the “C” in CLA, as used in the charter, stands for “county,” not for “chief.” Is that important? Probably not.
The “director of budget and management” does not appear in the ballot question – the first part – and might have come as a surprise to voters. But the more detailed charter amendment is clear: the official will be appointed by and report to the county executive.
The two positions are roughly – roughly – analogous to the Congressional Budget Office and Congressional Research Service, which are lodged in the federal government’s legislative branch and serve Congress; and the Office of Management and Budget, which reports directly to the president.
In other words, they are research and support staff for the legislative and executive branches, respectively. They’re on opposite teams. But the teams are not the Republicans and the Democrats. They are Congress and the president. The offices are nonpartisan.
The Congressional Budget Office, by the way, was modeled on the California Legislature's chief legislative analyst’s office, which similarly reports solely to state lawmakers, and similarly is not beholden to either party, no patter who holds the majority
In Los Angeles County, Measure G describes a CLA and OBM that, like their federal and state counterparts, staff the elected officials in their respective branches.
So why does Measure G specify “nonpartisan”? The word makes perfect sense in the context of federal and state governments, where political majorities rule legislative branches. In the county, though, candidates don’t run and victors do not serve as Republicans or Democrats. All of Los Angeles County government is nonpartisan, so the word – perhaps lifted from legislation establishing the state Chief Legislative Analyst’s Office – is unnecessarily confusing. The Task Force appears flummoxed by it, and has added the word independent, together with a lengthy definition that somewhat undermines the word.
The Task Force spent some time over the course of several meetings to distinguish the legislative analyst – the CLA who studies in-house legislation to advance the Board of Supervisors’ policy goals – from the legislative advocate, who lobbies Sacramento or Washington for bills and other actions to benefit the county. L.A. County’s advocate is known as the Legislative Affairs and Intergovernmental Relations office. Its fate is not specified in Measure G. The Task Force wisely recommends that it report to the county executive, who will now speak for the county in all intergovernmental matters.
Well, maybe not all. Even after 2028, Los Angeles County will not have a single, president-like unitary executive. We will have a plural executive, as does the city of L.A., California and most other states. The elected sheriff, district attorney and assessor all retain purview over their offices and will continue to each have their own intergovernmental relations staffs. They may well wind up lobbying against the county executive, the Board of Supervisors and each other on pending state or federal bills. That’s not much different from the way it works now. Measure G does not compel county officials to work together for the good of county residents. We will still need to elect good people.
Ten million people with the county executive's cell phone number is no way to provide constituent services, Brian Calderón Tabatabai tells the Task Force. (GRTF meeting video)
The Task Force continued its discussion of the county executive’s role in delivering constituent services alongside the Board of Supervisors. The current political season has generated some buzz about the topic in other jurisdictions, with social media focusing on how quickly Mayor Zohran Mamdani responded to a New Yorker’s post about a pothole (it has become a sort of series on TikTok), how Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass tried to do the same thing but couldn’t marshal street services in time for her social media post, and how Bass and her challenger Nithya Raman traded barbs at a recent debate over which one of them was or wasn’t responsible for homeless encampments in Raman’s City Council district, and who did or didn’t pick up the phone and call the other for help. Task Force member Brian Calderón Tabatabai correctly noted that the answer to constituent services in Los Angeles County simply cannot be 10 million people getting the county executive’s cell number.
But what, then, is the answer? The Task Force hasn’t quite gotten there yet. I suspect that there are volumes that could be written on the subject based on the whole Mamdani-Bass-Raman discussion alone.
Next: "Twenty extra pizzas."
Previously: "We didn't even know how to get into this building."