CALIFORNIA COMMENTARY : Change Rules, Not Just Players : Los Angeles is too bound up in its own internal conflicts to make decisions about the future.

A developer told me the other day that 30% to 40% of the cost of a house in Los Angeles is red tape. Everyone else I talk to--in and out of government--nods thoughtfully and says, “Yeah, that’s about right.”

The cost of buying a house is greater in Los Angeles than just about anywhere else. More people spend a greater part of their income on rental housing than anywhere else. And housing is an important consideration in economic growth, affecting business as well as personal decisions.

The red tape doesn’t come from reluctant or corrupt bureaucrats, it comes from the regulations that require more approvals. It comes from the democratization of decision-making to the point where everyone has a say, and no one has the authority to give a final yes or no. And it comes from the fear that things will get away from us. Maybe they have.

Some see the solution in terms of governmental structure, and call for charter reform as the best, perhaps the only way to take control of our lives. Voters have the authority, after all, to change the city’s constitution.

Some see the solution in regionalism, recognizing that many of the problems are not solvable by one city no matter how eager it is to solve them.

Others talk about leaders--or the lack thereof--and point to the idiosyncrasies of officeholders and their relationships.

Now that Tom Bradley has taken himself out of the race for mayor, and Daryl Gates is a memory and not a stone wall, it is time for the rest of us to stop and rethink what it will take to change the downward fortunes of the city. Bradley is not the only leader leaving office. However much we may want to a see a change at the top, if people leave because they can’t get their jobs done, it doesn’t bode well for their successors. A leader who can draw all of us together would be welcome--maybe a necessary condition--but given the current structure, no single individual will be able to solve the root causes of frustration: the red tape; the sense of loss of control over local decisions, the capacity to think and act with a citywide view. A mayor can overcome the divisions of authority with political clout, but that is an ephemeral quality easily lost in the give-and-take of uncompromising interests.

All levels of government are in trouble because they have fewer resources with which to balance the interests they represent. The lack of money, unfortunately, does not come with a corresponding decline in interest-group competition, whether it is developers versus homeowners, the homeless versus business, those who see education as the best long-term solution or those who see their best chances in ethnic representation. The groups fight harder, they hit on values most of us support, and it is hard to say “yes, you are right, but there is nothing to be done about it.”

The mayoral election to come is an opportunity for all candidates to offer their vision of the city and some notion of how they are going to attain it. We would be deceiving ourselves, however, if we put all our eggs in that basket. No mayor of any major city in the country has less authority than the mayor of Los Angeles. No structure of government in any city is as hard to move.

And we need to move. We need to be able to form coalitions, reach compromises and make decisions. Los Angeles has become the Evil City of reference since the King beating last year. That reputation, plus the serious long-term decline in industry and all the other problems that beset us, will not change unless and until we act to change them.

The problem is that no mayor, no City Council, can do it alone. In fact, much of it they couldn’t do together, because too many forces are pulling them apart without enough glue to unite them.

We need to change the rules of the game as much as we need to change the players.