Leadership Matters, Part II

In an earlier piece, I talked about the leadership styles (or lack thereof) of certain officials in response to Hurricane Katrina. I now examine leadership in a more local (for me) context: the transformation of Downtown Los Angeles.

Over the last thirty years or so, Downtown Los Angeles had been just a place for office workers to come to work at eight and then rush out again at five. Once the center of civic and cultural life, Downtown LA deteriorated to the point that anyone who was still on the streets at 6 pm was either drunk, homeless or up to no good. This urban decay was not only physical but also psychological. People had given up on Downtown until a businessman-turned-politician came out from under the Valley smog in 1993 to become mayor of America's second largest city.

His name is Richard Riordan, a liberal Republican who was more interested in getting the job done than ideology. In fact, his liberalism often rubbed his more conservative state and national Party cohorts the wrong way. He was well-connected in the business community, especially among the real estate developer crowd, and he put it to good use.

Three major projects, all started under his tenure as mayor, would anchor the current revitalization of the Downtown area: The Cathedral of Our Lady of Angels, the world's newest Catholic Cathedral, the Frank Gehry-designed Walt Disney Concert Hall and the Staples Center, which is the new home of the Los Angeles Lakers and Kings. Since their opening, all three venues have attracted enormous numbers of tourists to Downtown Los Angeles.

These anchor projects have stimulated a building boom Downtown. It's hard to miss the scores of new lofts, condos and apartments aimed at the Yuppie set. And there are plans in the works to make a billion dollars' worth of improvement in the Civic Center. More significantly, the long-neglected southern portions of Downtown are major beneficiaries of much of the current regentrification efforts.

We are still in the early stages of the Downtown Renaissance. There remain significant unresolved issues to address such as affordable housing in a city that's facing a severe housing shortage, quality education and crime rates. Nevertheless, the sentinnel indications all point to a robust future. And it all started with one leader who believed that a great city deserves a great Downtown.