LETTER/ANTON/1stjc/mark2nd

Some advice for L.A.

Congratulations on your January 6, 1997 commentary, “L.A. Needs Strong Leadership and Vision.”

You are correct about the successes of many of the county’s 88 cities and the failure of the City of Los Angeles.

To begin with, just about every city in Los Angeles County has a part-time city council of five members. They rotate the mayor’s position and they have effective city managers. Many of their functions are contracted out and they have low overhead.

The City of Los Angeles needs to reduce the size of its council, increase the size of its police department, contract for a weekly street cleaning program, eliminate their practice to not cooperate with the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), eliminate bureaucratic red tape, and develop effective public-private partnerships to revitalize our neighborhoods and create private-sector jobs.

Michael D. Antonovich

Supervisor, Fifth District

Los Angeles County