A bureaucratic oddity that has left hundreds of Los Angeles streets unpaved for up to eight decades is set to be addressed by the City Council Tuesday.
Many of the streets were officially "withdrawn" from public use as far back as the 1930s, amid a lack of funds, because they were deemed unsafe or not up to proper code but were mostly left open to the public for driving or walking as they crumbled and deteriorated throughout the decades.
Councilman Bob Blumenfield, who has been leading the drive on the council to address the issue, said he at first didn't quite believe that it was possible streets in his district were left unpaved for decades, but slowly came to realization that it was true.
"This has been a very big issue for me in my district since I took office. There are so many streets out there, throughout the city, but particularly in my district, where you have no clue you are driving or walking on a street that is technically not in public use," Blumenfield said during a meeting of the Public Works and Gang Reduction Committee earlier this month.
"Constituents contact me and say, 'How come my street hasn't been paved in 80 years?' And we say, 'That can't be the case,' and we look into it and they are right, their street was taken out of public use in the 1930s."
A city report asked for in a motion authored by Blumenfield found that Los Angeles has 374 streets that have been withdrawn from use.
The report found that multiple ordinances and other City Council actions as far back as the 1930s have withdrawn streets from public use, and that in general, these ordinances authorize and direct the Board of Public Works to return streets to public use when they are found to be safe and passable. But the Board of Public Works adopted a policy many years ago that required streets to be built out to city standards in determining that the street was safe and passable, leading them not to reinstate the streets for paving, even through other nearby streets might also not meet current city standards but have not been withdrawn and still receive regular maintenance.
This Kafkaesque-like scenario went unnoticed for decades, and the report found that many of the streets were still in use "even though they are technically withdrawn from public use."
According to the report, Blumenfied's district in the West San Fernando Valley has the most withdrawn streets, at 84. Councilman David Ryu, whose district includes the Hollywood Hills, has the second most, with 81.
The decision to withdraw streets was caused by a state statute that has since been repealed, according to the Los Angeles Times, and was intended in part to prevent liability claims against the city for damage from defective streets. But Ryu said he was not buying that legal argument.
"While these streets have been withdrawn, the city still has a liability on them, which makes absolutely no sense," Ryu said.
The Public Works and Gang Reduction committee recommended a new ordinance that would reverse all the old ordinances and other rules that have withdrawn the streets from use, and that recommendation is now set to be voted on by the full City Council. The report also said the city can address in the future appropriate measures for the "expected small number of streets" that may not be appropriate for public use.
"If a street is really not safe and it's horribly dangerous then people shouldn't be driving on it," Blumenfield said.
