Vote Backs New Agency for Rail Line

In a stinging repudiation of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s “poor record,” the Assembly overwhelmingly approved a bill Thursday that will create another agency to finish the job of building a trolley-like rail line between downtown Los Angeles and Pasadena.

The so-called rescue bill to establish the Metro Blue Line Construction Authority was passed on a 62-7 vote and sent back to the Senate, which is expected to approve it as early as today. The Senate voted 27 to 4 in favor of an earlier version of bill, and now simply must concur in the Assembly’s subsequent amendments.

The legislation also must go to Gov. Pete Wilson. A Wilson spokesman said Thursday that the governor supports the goal of the measure but needs to review the final language to make sure that it does not increase state costs.

The MTA neither endorsed nor opposed the bill.

The project’s supporters still must close a shortfall of as much as $259 million in the $804-million Blue Line construction budget. But they believe that a single-purpose authority, without the weight of MTA’s baggage, will find a way to build the light-rail line “far more cost effectively,” according to Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Burbank), the bill’s principal author.

“A streamlined, low-overhead construction authority can build the Pasadena Blue Line faster, cheaper and better than the MTA with its bloated overhead and poor record of construction supervision,” Schiff said.

The Bus Riders Union has opposed the bill, contending that it would siphon away funds needed by the MTA to comply with a federal court order mandating improvements to its problem-plagued bus system.

“Where are the bills that force MTA to fix its bus system?” asked Constance L. Rice, the attorney who represented the bus riders in the court case that produced the consent decree. “What keeps these people from focusing on the elephant in the bathtub as opposed to the bug in the sink?”

Under the legislation, the new authority would be created on Jan. 1 and then have 90 days to submit to the state a plan for funding completion of the line.

The MTA spent more than $220 million on engineering and preliminary construction on the Blue Line before the agency’s deepening financial problems forced work to be halted earlier this year.

Although the MTA also suspended work on subway extensions to the Eastside and Mid-City, the Pasadena line was singled out for special legislation because it was the furthest along.

The project also has enjoyed support from influential Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa (D-Los Angeles) and Senate Majority Leader Richard Polanco (D-Los Angeles), whose districts would be served by the line.

The legislation would strip the MTA of the power to award major contracts and oversee final design and construction of the 13.6-mile line.

The line would run from Union Station through Chinatown, Lincoln Heights, Highland Park, South Pasadena, Old Pasadena and down the center of the Foothill Freeway to eastern Pasadena. The bill, its supporters say, could put the project on track to open in 2002, five years later than originally promised.

A new five-member board would be composed of representatives from the MTA, Los Angeles, Pasadena, South Pasadena and the San Gabriel Valley Council of Governments. The governor would appoint a nonvoting member of the board.

The bill allows the board to select an executive director, appoint staff and hire consultants.

The new decision-makers would be governed by less stringent conflict-of-interest rules than the extremely tight $10 limit on individual campaign contributions that state lawmakers imposed on MTA board members.

Schiff’s legislation extends the $10 limit on gifts to members of the new agency, but allows campaign contributions of up to $250 from engineering and construction companies and other firms that seek a piece of the action on the Pasadena project.

Blue Line advocates led by Pasadena city officials believe the new agency could slash as much as $100 million from the $804-million cost by narrowing the project’s scope, awarding fixed-price contracts and imposing strict cost controls.

The legislation requires the MTA and the state to transfer to the new authority all funds earmarked for the Pasadena line. And the new agency would be granted the power to issue debt to complete the rail project, as the MTA has done. But the bill prohibits borrowing against any future fare revenue.

Although financing is the biggest hurdle that will face the new agency, MTA Chief Executive Officer Julian Burke said he believes the authority may be able to construct the Pasadena line sooner than MTA could.

“I hope that they can figure it out. . . .They may be able to find financing we can’t find,” Burke said. “If somebody can take on a piece of this and do it faster . . . I think that is appropriate.”

Once the Pasadena line is built, the legislation calls for it to be turned back to the MTA, which would operate the trains. The MTA is now receiving additional light-rail vehicles for the Pasadena line. They are similar to those in operation between Long Beach and Los Angeles and on the Green Line from Norwalk to El Segundo.

Although the Pasadena line would also carry the Blue Line name, it would not connect directly with the Long Beach-to-Los Angeles Blue Line. Instead, passengers from Pasadena would have to transfer to the Red Line subway at Union Station and ride to the downtown Metro Center station where they would change again to a train bound for Long Beach.