Even as Los Angeles leaders pledge to combat gang violence, a dysfunctional city bureaucracy is spending millions of dollars on unproven programs and is failing to coordinate with schools, law enforcement and social agencies, according to a report set for release today.
Produced by City Controller Laura Chick, the report assails the city for taking a hodgepodge approach to youth and gang services. The city scatters oversight across more than a dozen departments that duplicate efforts and award contracts to antigang programs without establishing goals or objectives, the report says.
At a press conference this morning, Chick will call for a bureaucratic shake-up at City Hall that she admits could be politically difficult to execute.
The controller urges the city to place everything under a single entity in the office of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who would have the authority and visibility to bring about change while bearing direct responsibility for progress. Such a move could reduce the City Council's influence over how programs are managed and which communities receive attention.
In the report, made available Wednesday, Chick did not call for new spending but for the city to redirect $19 million currently doled out by the Community Development Department to programs and agencies that do not necessarily work on gang prevention.
And she called for the city to work more closely with the Los Angeles Unified School District, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department and other organizations.
"The city hasn't been doing this right," Chick said in an interview. "We have to completely change. It's fragmented. It's not focused. We're not directing the money to the places that need it the most."
Chick's audit echoes the findings of another city-sponsored report last year by the Advancement Project, a public policy organization based in Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles, which called for the city to mount a $1-billion Marshall Plan-like effort to attack the spread of gangs through jobs and other alternatives.
Villaraigosa built on parts of that plan in 2007 when he appointed a gang czar in his office and announced plans to step up law enforcement and intervention programs in eight "gang reduction zones" in South Los Angeles, the Eastside, northeast San Fernando Valley and other areas.
Police say they have gained the upper hand, for the time being: Gang-related killings dropped 27% in 2007 from the year before.
