Making Neighborhood Councils Work

By Jim Hahn

A Plan for Los Angeles' Neighborhood Councils

To be effective, neighborhood councils need money. It's as simple as that. Like a start-up business, neighborhood councils need office space, equipment, and capital.

Cities throughout the country with thriving forms of neighborhood councils have recognized that the key to community empowerment is directly funding those communities. For example New York City's 59 community boards receive $10.4 million in funding. Similarly, in Seattle, Washington $9 million is provided to neighborhoods. In Vancouver, Washington, neighborhood councils receive matching grants as well as funding for traffic and neighborhood improvements. Similarly, in Portland, Oregon, neighborhood councils receive City funding for office space and equipment, as well as for community projects.

Neighborhood councils funded with adequate resources can best meet their community's needs by undertaking projects to improve residents' quality of life, whether by supporting clean-up efforts or by enhancing open space. Success in implementing these projects will also demonstrate to residents the importance of neighborhood councils and, in turn, foster greater participation.

The City must also coordinate its existing neighborhood oriented funding, such as the Los Angeles Neighborhood Initiative (LANI) and the Targeted Neighborhood Initiative (TNI), with neighborhood councils so that neighborhood councils are empowered to develop and implement these efforts in a manner that is most consistent with a community's needs and goals.

It's imperative that the City place neighborhoods themselves at the center of its neighborhood council efforts. By providing neighborhood councils with meaningful resources, the City will accomplish this goal.

2. Structure the Department of Neighborhood Empowerment (DONE) to be an incubator for neighborhood councils

In order to thrive, neighborhood councils must receive technical support from DONE. This support is particularly important in the early stages of a neighborhood council's formation and operation. The effectiveness of Council District Eight's Empowerment Congress is due to the tremendous support provided to it by Councilman Mark Ridley-Thomas in staff time and resources. The Empowerment Congress' success teaches us that there is no substitute for this support. Moreover, only with this support will there be a level playing field among the City's varied communities in their capacity to establish strong neighborhood councils. As a result, it is essential that the City fund DONE at a sufficient level to enable it to provide communities with needed technical assistance.

The City must also leverage existing resources -- not only should staff in City departments be charged with assisting in the flow of information to communities, as recommended in the current neighborhood council plan, City staff from the array of departments with a community function should be assigned to DONE and provide expertise in how best to assist communities.

3. Designate Neighborhood Commissioners to have regional as well as Citywide Oversight of Neighborhood Council Policy

To supplement DONE staff and provide leadership to neighborhood councils, each member of the Commission on Neighborhoods should have oversight of the neighborhood councils within specified geographic areas. In this way, neighborhood councils would have an advocate dedicated to their specific concerns. Additionally, each Neighborhood Commissioner would be able to develop a regional perspective on the variety of issues affecting neighborhood councils.

4. Create an Office of the Neighborhood Advocate within the Mayor's Office to assure effective coordination and implementation of all City neighborhood efforts

The City's various neighborhood programs must be coordinated by an Office of Neighborhood Advocate within the Mayor's Office to assure the highest level of oversight and coordination of these efforts. This Office would be led by a Deputy Mayor for Neighborhoods and would be charged with implementing the City's vision for neighborhood development and empowerment.

A primary function of the Office of Neighborhood Advocate would be to assure that neighborhood councils are linked to the City's neighborhood improvement efforts, such as TNI and the Neighborhood Matching Fund Program. In addition, the Office would oversee service delivery by community-oriented City departments such as DONE, the Library Department, and Public Works' Street Services Bureau, so that all of the City's neighborhood functions are coordinated and serve communities in a systematic and comprehensive manner. Moreover, the Office would also link neighborhood improvement efforts with neighborhood service delivery so that these efforts complement one another, thereby leveraging all available resources toward an intensive neighborhood improvement program.

For too long, the City has compartmentalized it neighborhood efforts. An Office of the Neighborhood Advocate within the Mayor's Office will create the needed bridge among neighborhood councils, neighborhood improvement programs, and neighborhood service delivery.

5. Require Community Impact Statements for City Council Actions affecting Neighborhoods

The current neighborhood council plan establishes a mechanism -- known as the Early Notification System -- by which neighborhood councils will receive information about pending City issues and have the ability to provide input. However, the City Council and Mayor remain free to disregard this input.

One way to assure that neighborhood councils' concerns are taken in to account is to require that Council agendas and city reports upon which the City Council and the Mayor rely in their decision making, indicate the position taken by the neighborhood councils impacted by the decision at issue.

Right now, every item in the City Council Agenda with a financial component includes a "Financial Impact Statement" which sets forth the cost of the item. The City should also include a "Community Impact Statement" which indicates the Neighborhood Council's position and briefly describes the basis for this decision. Only then can a neighborhood council have confidence that its viewpoint achieves the visibility it deserves. Moreover, while the Councilmember of the Council District in which the neighborhood council is located may be aware of its position, this procedure would present a community's concerns to the City Council as a whole.

6. Create Neighborhood Plans to Assure Two-Way Communication Between Neighborhood Councils and the City

The flow of information under the current plan's Early Notification System is from the City to neighborhood councils and back. However, equally important is for neighborhood councils to provide elected officials with early notification of a community's own emerging issues.

One way to make sure that communities have direct input to elected officials is to establish a system by which neighborhood councils, with the assistance of staff from various City departments, submit to the Mayor and City Council, Neighborhood Plans in which the neighborhood council sets forth a community's key goals and concerns. The City Council would in turn be required to review and adopt each plan. As a result, elected officials could not later disavow knowledge of a community problem when it eventually surfaces. This approach is followed in such cities as Seattle and Vancouver where community members and city staff work together to develop the steps to accomplish their goals. Communities then report on their progress on a monthly basis to make sure that their goals become a reality.

Los Angeles should go one step further and create a process in which neighborhood councils inform the Department of Neighborhood Empowerment when the council is alerted to a new community issue. It should then be the responsibility of the Department to disseminate this information to the appropriate City agencies.

Take, for example, the situation in which a neighborhood council informs the Department of new graffiti proliferation. The Department would in turn share this information with the Police Department to address the criminal aspect of this issue, the Board of Public Works to address clean-up, as well as the Council office. In this way, communities will get the integrated problem solving envisioned in the City Charter.

7. Mandate that Neighborhood Councils have input in the City Budget and in service delivery priorities

Neighborhood councils must have a voice in the most important areas impacting communities -- the City's Budget and service delivery.

With respect to the Budget, neighborhood councils must play a role in each step of the budget process -- City Departments' preparation of their Budget proposals for consideration by the Mayor, the Mayor's preparation of the Mayor's annual proposed Budget, and the City Council's review and adoption of the Budget subject to the Mayor's veto.

Before submitting their budgets to the Mayor, City Departments must receive input from neighborhood councils on community priorities and develop a budget proposal which reflects this input. The Mayor must in turn present the annual City Budget to neighborhood councils for their review and comment. Neighborhood Councils must also be able to submit motions for the City Council's consideration prior to the City Council's approval of the Budget.

It is also essential that neighborhood councils have a voice in the allocation of City services to a given community - whether its which trees get trimmed or which street gets paved. Accordingly, City departments must receive input from neighborhood councils and develop annual work plans which reflect this input.

8. Provide a role for Neighborhood Councils in General Manager Performance Reviews

Neighborhood Councils must play a meaningful role in evaluating the General Managers of City Departments. Community members are best positioned to evaluate whether a City Department has delivered an appropriate level of services and the manner in which those services are delivered. Yet, right now, community members have no voice in the evaluation of General Managers and their salary levels.

To correct this omission, neighborhood councils should provide General Manager evaluations to the Mayor and form a basis of the Mayor's General Manager performance review.

9. Require City Departments to meet with Neighborhood Councils Quarterly on a regional basis

It is not enough for information to be conveyed by the City over the Internet to City residents. This practice in no way brings government closer to residents as was promised to voters in the City Charter. In order to put a face to government and develop a dialogue with residents about how and why services are delivered, City Departments must meet with neighborhood councils quarterly on a regional basis, organized around each of the City's Area Planning Commissions, both to present their upcoming plans and explain the status of current issues. Additionally, those departments most directly involved in service delivery to communities such as Public Works, the Department of Building & Safety, and LAPD, should meet with neighborhood councils more frequently as needed.

10. Provide Neighborhood Councils with a means to alert the City to Important Issues

The proposed neighborhood council plan's emphasis on an information flow from the City to residents ignores the fact that Los Angeles residents are already well informed about a broad array of issues and are often more informed than their government representatives. In many cases, a community's problem has not been the lack of information but rather not having the ability to have its concerns acknowledged and responded to by City government.

For example, long before the issue of racial profiling was discussed by the City Council it was a topic that was well known to communities throughout the City. Significant problems could have been avoided if City government paid more attention early on to the concerns expressed for years on this issue.

Neighborhood Councils must therefore have the ability to pass resolutions expressing positions on Citywide issues. These Resolutions must in turn be placed on the Council Agenda for adoption. In this way, neighborhood councils will have a direct voice in City government and government will serve as an Early Notification System to government of citywide issues impacting communities.