Governance: The Collision of Politics and Cooperation

Three newly established public agencies built regional rail projects in Los Angeles County from 1978 to 2002. The Los Angeles County Transportation Commission, the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority, and the Alameda Corridor Transportation Authority were experiments in regional governance. Conventional understanding of these agencies only partially explains their successes and failures. One path to improved understanding is to combine research on the politics of designing new public agencies with research on cooperation in collective action problems. What emerges is an untold story of American politics: the evolution of mechanisms that promote cooperation. Four findings emerge: (1) conflict is inevitable; (2) public agencies can succeed despite the problems of politics; (3) successful regional solutions are intensely local; and (4) cooperation emerges from supply-side mechanisms that create new resources rather than reallocate existing resources. The limits of politics are neither random nor predestined—neither is the governance solution.     

Antecedents or Processes? Determinants of Perceived Effectiveness of Interorganizational Collaborations for Public Service Delivery

ABSTRACT

This article introduces a framework of antecedents, processes, and perceived outcomes to evaluate interorganizational collaborations for children and family service delivery in Los Angeles County, California. The results showed that resource acquisitions, organizational legitimacy, partner characteristics, and supply-side preconditions for collaboration could affect perceived collaboration outcomes. The effects of most of antecedents on perceived outcomes were, however, mediated by collaborative processes and perceived effectiveness of collaborative ventures were mainly premised on the existence of processes for leveraging resources and building trust between partners.     

“Another World is Possible”: Theorizing the Radical Politics of Democracy,North and South

This article examines the cultural politics of organizing in the Occupy LA movement. Utilizing ethnographic methods and the analysis of digital media sources produced by a variety of Occupy activists, this study focuses on how members of Occupy LA, in the post camp eviction period, made efforts to infuse a new kind of class politics among members of the newly and structurally dispossessed in the Los Angeles area. It focuses mainly on their efforts to build bridges among a variety of community based social movements during specific actions such as May Day 2012 and their efforts to ally themselves with organizations fighting the gentrification of Downtown Los Angeles and Skid Row in particular. Utilizing the theoretical lens of David Harvey's notion of “accumulation by dispossession” it concludes that Occupy LA has helped to open up new opportunities for rethinking the concept of “class consciousness” and its relationship to the structural dispossession of black and Latino communities. It also concludes that while this new politics is tentative and fragile, it has also opened up a creativity in thinking through the practical organizational issues of dealing with organizing across lines of race, class, and gender.     

Explaining Responsiveness in Collaboration: Administrator and Citizen Role Perceptions

Between 2003 and 2006, researchers facilitated a collaborative learning process with representatives of Los Angeles neighborhood councils and officials from city agencies. In two cases, each involving a large city agency, the quality of responsiveness on the part of agency officials to participating citizens was substantially different. This study considers the reasons why agency officials differed in their responsiveness. Using an inductive qualitative and quantitative content analysis across three sources of data, the study develops theory pertaining to bureaucratic responsiveness to citizens in collaborative processes. Specifically, the case findings are generalized to theory through seven propositions for future study. The study's key finding is that administrator and citizen perceptions of their own and the other party's roles may influence the quality of responsive behavior in collaborative activity. The propositions identify subfactors or contingencies that may allow administrators to be more responsive to citizens in collaborative processes.     

Thick Red Tape and the Thin Blue Line: A Field Study on Reducing Administrative Burden in Police Recruitment

Police departments struggle to recruit officers, and voluntary drop-off of candidates exacerbates this challenge. Using four years of administrative data and a field experiment conducted in the Los Angeles Police Department, the authors analyze the impact of administrative burden on the likelihood that a candidate will remain in the recruitment process. Findings show that reducing friction costs to participation and simplifying processes improve compliance, as behavioral public administration would predict. Applicants who were offered simpler, standardized processes completed more tests and were more likely to be hired. Later reductions to perceived burden led to an 8 percent increase in compliance, with a 60 percent increase in compliance within two weeks. However, removing steps that would have allowed for better understanding of eligibility kept unqualified candidates in the process for longer, reducing organizational efficiency. These results extend the field's understanding of how administrative burden can impact the selection of talent into government.     

Using Common‐Pool Resource Principles to Design Local Government Fiscal Sustainability

This article analyzes local government fiscal sustainability as a common‐pool resource (CPR) problem. Comparing the experiences of Los Angeles County, San Bernardino City, and San Bernardino County, California, the analysis applies a framework developed from three decades of CPR research to show the importance of six micro‐situational variables—communications with the full set of participants, known reputations of participants, high marginal per capita return, entry or exit capabilities, longer time horizon, and agreed‐upon sanctioning capabilities—in shaping collective action dynamics and building the trust and reciprocity among stakeholders needed to achieve fiscal sustainability. The underlying contextual conditions for these micro‐situational variables vary based on specific socioeconomic and political settings, but the findings suggest that institutions and processes can be designed based on several well‐tested principles in CPR governance to encourage stakeholders to look beyond their immediate self‐interests and make decisions that account for the community's long‐term fiscal sustainability.     

THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF LIFE-SAFETY: THE CITY OF LOS ANGELES AND "HAZARDOUS-STRUCTURE ABATEMENT," 1973–1981

The life-safety threat posed by earthquake-vulnerable buildings is widely recognized. This paper outlines the long battle fought in the City of Los Angeles to enact an ordinance intended to abate the hazard. The author also offers a series of both necessary and sufficient factors explaining Los Angelesl ultimate success.     

COMMUNITY COLLABORATIONS:

Many communities are now involved in collaborations in order to solve problems which no one group or organization can deal with by themselves. They find they must organize in a unique way that allows them to try to solve these problems on equal terms with the public, non-profit and private sectors. These unique collaborations are referred to in this article as network structures. Network structures require the use of different management styles and policy instruments than are used in more typical bureaucratic efforts. This article is based on a study of four community groups in the Los Angeles area which organized in such a way to try to improve conditions of families and children. Each of these collaborations highlights the impact of network structures on the ability to sustain effective collaborative efforts. In addition they point to new roles and changing relationships among government at all levels and those participants outside the government. They also highlight what participants, both inside and outside the public sector, will need to understand about how to organize and mange in these unique settings.     

Citizens’ use of policy symbols and frames

This paper argues that citizens are capable of developing and promoting complex policy symbols, and that these symbols include supporting frames that explain and justify them. Based on a long-term study of education policies in Los Angeles, California, the paper uses interpretive methods to reconstruct and analyze these frames. Citizens developed two specific policy symbols while the district was engulfed in a desegregation debate; citizens identified schools as places where students gained academic knowledge and as institutions that affected broader race relations. However, education policy in Los Angeles could not support these two symbols over a long period of time, and a political movement to end mandatory busing eventually caused the academic symbol (originally the weaker of the two symbols) to become dominant. This trend reflects broader national discussions, in which education is now discussed in terms of standards and accountability and is evidence of continuing racism in US policy.     

Intergovernmental Challenges of the 1984 Olympic Games

Planning and managing the 1984 Olympic Games presented uniquefinancial and intergovernmental challenges for city officialsin Los Angeles, but governmental cooperation and an innovativepublic/private partnership to finance and run the Games provedto be successful. Under strict restrictions against spendinglocal tax dollars, the City of Los Angeles assigned managementof the Games to a non-profit committee which raised privatefunds to finance the Games. In cooperation with surroundingjurisdictions and the federal government, the city providedkey services (such as police and fire protection, transportationplanning, and visitor services) under contract to the OlympicCommittee and used two Olympic-related taxes to pay for theseservices, with the Olympic Committee paying for additional expenses.The 1984 Olympics resulted in an estimated economic impact of$3.3 billion on Southern California and left Los Angeles witha number of new and refurbished sports and cultural facilities.Moreover, the Olympic Organizing Committee accrued a surplusof over $215 million, 40 percent of which was targeted to benefityouth sports organizations in southern California.     

Riot and Reason: Crafting an Urban Policy Response

This article examines the federal policy response to urban problemsin the aftermath of the 1992 Los Angeles riot. Although thefederal government failed to enact a long-term urban aid initiativein 1992, a number of locally based comprehensive urban initiativeswere under way in several cities across the country. The futureof national urban policy, however, will require a reconceptualizationof the problems of inner cities, and ultimately will dependon significant restructuring of fiscal federalism relationshipsamong and between the federal, state, and local governments.     

LA's the place: The Urban character and significance of Los Angeles 1

Michael Dear, H. Eric Shockman, and Greg Hise, eds., Rethinking Los Angeles. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1996.

William Fulton, The Reluctant Metropolis: The Politics of Urban Growth in Los Angeles. Point Arena, CA: Solano Press Books, 1997)

Roger Keil, Los Angeles: Globalization, Urbanization and Social Struggles. Chichester, UK: 1998.

Allen J. Scott and Edward J. Soja, eds., The City: Los Angeles and Urban Theory at the End of the Twentieth Century. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996.     

From Participatory Reform to Social Capital: Micro‐Motives and the Macro‐Structure of Civil Society Networks

Although a wide‐ranging literature explores the favorable effects of social capital, it is only relatively recently that systematic attention has been directed to the manner in which social networks emerge and the consequent implications for civic engagement and collaborative governance. This article employs advanced social network statistical models to examine civic network emergence following a participatory reform in Los Angeles. Findings suggest that the reform fostered a number of favorable network attributes supportive of democratic participation. At the same time, subtle but ubiquitous effects of socioeconomic sorting had the unintended and undesirable effect of elevating higher‐status actors within the emergent civic network. These findings suggest that macro‐level policy interventions are required to foster the development of ties that promote cross‐talk among socioeconomically distinct community groups.     

Spontaneous or Constructed? Neighborhood Governance Reforms in Los Angeles and Shanghai

Can grassroots government succeed on its own without state involvement? By comparing approaches in two metropolitan governments—neighborhood councils in Los Angeles and resident committees in Shanghai—Bin Chen of the City University of New York at Baruch College, Terry L. Cooper of the University of Southern California, and Rong Sun of Shanghai Tongji University underscore the need to understand the interrelationships among the political and administrative structures where these specific reforms are implemented. Their analysis points out that the efficacy of a government-initiated civic engagement program depends on a balanced combination of state involvement and community self-organization.     

Evaluating California’s Housing Element Law,Housing Equity,and Housing Production (1990–2007)

Since 1969, California’s Housing Element Law has required that municipalities address housing equity and housing production. In California, housing equity means that a municipality has planned for the future production of low-income housing that is priced from 0 to 120% of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s median family income, and market-rate housing that is priced higher than 121%. For a purposive sample of municipalities (Sacramento and Los Angeles regions, 1990 to 2007, n = 53), this research found that as compliance with the law increased, the sample experienced deficient low-income housing production but surplus market-rate housing production. Mixed-effects models indicated that compliant municipalities were associated not only with increased low-income housing production but also with decreased annual housing production in comparison to noncompliant municipalities. While these associations contrast with Lewis, they suggest that municipal compliance may support California’s goal of providing housing equity but may also constrain California’s overall housing production.     

Binational Vital Signs: A Quality of Life Indicator Program for the San Diego–Tijuana Metropolitan Region1

This is a study of a binational community indicator program for the San Diego–Tijuana metropolitan area (SDTMA). The key objective of the research was to produce a citizen-generated community indicator program (CIP). The study is closely based on the work of the two focus groups held in the two cities and offers a small program that has immediate practical potential for implementation. The program consists of a suite of thirty-five indicators for which data has been identified and provided. Fifteen of the indicators apply to Tijuana, twenty to San Diego. The program is built around principles of community well-being or quality of life (QOL). It is the first subregional attempt at the scale of the United States-Mexico Bi-National Region (BNR) to integrate existing environmental, social, and economic data into a single coherent program to inform community leaders about the condition of the SDTMA. The region covered by the CIP generally consists of the urbanized core of metropolitan Tijuana, the city of San Diego, and associated cities like Chula Vista and El Cajon within the southern part of San Diego County.     

Grizzly Bear conservation in the Foothills Model Forest: appraisal of a collaborative ecosystem management effort

In west-central Alberta, Canada, an ambitious collaborative conservation program for grizzly bears began in 1999, after extensive controversy over the Cheviot coal mine project and successful negotiation of a unique federal–provincial strategic framework for grizzly bear conservation. Unfortunately that program was effectively terminated without any substantive implementation of its research findings. The regional ecosystem approach for conserving grizzlies in the Foothills Model Forest originated in federal and provincial legislative processes but proved vulnerable to shifting goals and containment by a single powerful participant. This case study’s results demonstrate vulnerabilities of the ecosystem management approach to conserving large carnivores. To enable other such conservation efforts to achieve their goals, we recommend supporting emergent small-scale initiatives and designing collaborative institutions that limit the potential for containment of decision processes.     

House poor in Los Angeles: examining patterns of housing-induced poverty by race,nativity, and legal status

Housing affordability in the United States is generally operationalized using the ratio approach, with those allocating more than thirty percent of income to shelter costs considered to have housing affordability challenges. Alternative standards have been developed that focus on residual income, whether income remaining after housing expenditures is sufficient to meet non-housing needs. This study employs Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey data to consider racial/ethnic, nativity and legal status differences in one residual income standard. Logistic regression analyses of housing-induced poverty focus on whether there are differences among five distinct groups: US born Latinos, Non-Hispanic Whites, and African Americans, authorized Latino immigrants, and unauthorized Latino immigrants. Results suggest that: (1) Latino natives are significantly more likely to be in housing-induced poverty than African Americans and Latino immigrants, and (2) unauthorized Latino immigrants are not more likely to experience the outcome than other groups. The present work extends previous research. First, the results provide additional evidence of the value of operationalizing housing affordability using a residual income standard. Alternatives to the ratio approach deserve more empirical attention from a wider range of scholars and policymakers interested in housing affordability. Second, housing scholarship to date generally differentiates among Latinos by ethnicity, nativity, and citizenship. The present study contributes to emerging research investigating heterogeneity among Latinos by nativity and legal status.     

Reducing child support debt and its consequences: Can forgiveness benefit all?

As child support debt owed nationally persists at enormous levels, both noncustodial parents and the custodial families who are not receiving support suffer significant hardships, and states are forced to expend greater resources on collection and enforcement efforts. This paper presents findings from an evaluation of a demonstration program developed to help noncustodial parents with large child support debts reduce their debt while simultaneously increasing child support paid to families, through gradual forgiveness of arrears conditional on payment of current child support obligations. The evaluation employs a randomized experimental design, nonexperimental analyses using propensity score matching and multilevel modeling techniques, and focus groups and follow‐up interviews. Results show a pattern of effects that suggests individuals responded to the program as intended. State‐ and family‐owed child support debt balances decreased for program participants, and participants paid more toward their child support obligations and arrears and made more frequent child support payments. The study findings suggest promise for the effectiveness of this program model in reducing child support debt burdens and in increasing families' receipt of child support, and they also point to ways in which the implementation of the program might be improved. © 2011 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.     

The effect of attending full‐day kindergarten on English learner students

A significant and growing English learner (EL) population attends public schools in the United States. Evidence suggests they are at a disadvantage when entering school and their achievement lags behind non‐EL students. Some educators have promoted full‐day kindergarten programs as especially helpful for EL students. We take advantage of the large EL population and variation in full‐day kindergarten implementation in the Los Angeles Unified School District to examine the impact of full‐day kindergarten on academic achievement, retention, and English language fluency using difference‐in‐differences models. We do not find signficant effects of full‐day kindergarten on most academic outcomes and English fluency through second grade. However, we find that EL students attending full‐day kindergarten were 5 percentage points less likely to be retained before second grade and there are differential effects for several outcomes by student and school characteristics. © 2011 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.