The votes are counted, and Nithya Raman is officially our mayor-elect.
asserted
Raman → count → ?
Campaign promises run into reality.
asserted
promises → run → reality
One thing is clear: LA cannot afford another administration that manages dysfunction instead of fixing it.
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that → afford → it
Raman’s new mandate is not “socialism,” but rebuilding City Hall around competence, responsibility and accountability.
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mandate → rebuild → competence
Raman campaigned as “an agent of change,” and change is what the times demand.
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times → campaign → what
Under outgoing Mayor Karen Bass, the city tried extracting more money out of residents through higher service fees rather than restructuring departments to cut costs.
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city → try → costs
It is significant that Raman is not just a politician, but a trained urban planner, with a master’s degree in the field from MIT.
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Raman → train → MIT
Now she has an extraordinary opportunity to apply that training to how the city is governed.
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city → have → training
Merging the Bureau of Street Services with the LA Department of Transportation would be a major step toward efficient operations and savings.
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Merging → merge → operations
In the current setup, for example, sidewalks and crosswalks are excluded from transportation and mobility planning.
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sidewalks → exclude → planning
That means one agency tries to widen streets to outdated standards, while the other seeks grant funds to narrow them back for safety and livability.
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other → mean → safety
I am certain the mayor-elect understands quite well that LA’s cumbersome government has made confusion systemic.
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confusion → understand → ?
Authority overlaps, responsibility is unclear, and accountability is lost.
uncertain
accountability → lose → ?
Without clear ownership, problems persist, costs rise, and government fails to deliver.
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government → persist → ownership
It is this confusion of responsibility that must be eliminated.
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that → eliminate → responsibility
The Department of Public Works also needs to be restructured.
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Department → need → Works
The department was initially a reasonable concept, housing all city physical infrastructure projects with multiple obligations.
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department → house → obligations
But with age and time, it became a colossal body that oversees tasks ranging from bridge construction to the building of wastewater treatment plants; from graffiti removal to trash collection and street light maintenance.
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that → become → collection
The federal government and state governments long ago realized the need to split these functions into different departments.
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government → realize → departments
I have been pressing the city to make a similar change for over two years, and I am pleased that Angelenos voted to amend the city charter and restructure DPW.
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Angelenos → press → DPW
The third piece of the puzzle is transferring the Bureau of Street Lighting to the LA Department of Water and Power (LADWP), which makes sense on many fronts.
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which → transfer → fronts
Street lighting is a prime sore point with residents, who blame darkness for making neighborhoods feel eerie, and for spreading crime.
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neighborhoods → blame → crime
This figure likely understates the true extent of the problem, as unreported outages may leave even more areas of the city without adequate lighting.
uncertain
outages → understate → lighting
Widespread outages increase the risks of traffic collisions, pedestrian and bicycling accidents, crime, and attacks on vulnerable residents.
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outages → increase → residents
Currently, the Bureau of Street Lighting and LADWP perform complementary and overlapping street-lighting functions under separate organizations.
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Bureau → perform → organizations
LADWP already possesses the engineering expertise, skilled field crews, equipment, dispatch systems, and procurement capabilities to take over the entire job.
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LADWP → possess → job
In 1998, Mayor Richard Riordan recommended that LADWP should take over street lighting work.
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LADWP → recommend → work
However, the bureau, with its lobbying and backdoor political maneuvering, kept things as they were.
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they → keep → things
It is my hope that the new mayor will move swiftly, as expected, to make the city efficient and to end the squandering of tax dollars.
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city → move → dollars
Has the change we urgently need finally arrived?
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we → need → ?
Can the new mayor make LA government efficient by simplifying City Hall, streamlining outdated departments, eliminating overlapping duties, clarifying authority, demanding measurable results, and holding department leaders accountable?
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leaders → make → results
The goals are clear: fewer bureaucratic layers, clearer authority, faster decisions, and creating a government citizens can understand and trust.
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citizens → create → government
New policies mean little if an outdated system cannot implement them.
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system → mean → them
Mayor-elect Raman must undertake the Herculean task of restructuring City Hall itself.
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Raman → undertake → Hall
Confusion must yield to clarity, fragmentation to responsibility, and bureaucracy to institutions equipped to act.
asserted
Confusion → yield → institutions
Transforming the city begins with making its government governable.
asserted
government → transform → city
The Aporia
