Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority - Governance

Governance

Metro is governed by a Board of Directors whose 13 members are:

• The five Los Angeles County Supervisors
• The mayor of Los Angeles
• Three Los Angeles mayor-appointees (at least one of whom must be a L.A. City Council member)
• Four city council members from cities other than Los Angeles, but within L.A. county representing those 87 cities (selected by the L.A. County City Selection Committee): currently, the representatives are from Duarte, Glendale, Lakewood, and Santa Monica
• The Governor of California appoints one non-voting member (traditionally the Director of Caltrans District 7).

In addition, Service Councils, composed of political appointees from various regions of Los Angeles County, approve service changes and oversee routes within a region. There are five sectors: Gateway Cities, San Fernando Valley, San Gabriel Valley, South Bay, and Westside/Central. Governance councils approve service changes (with the MTA board retaining veto authority over any change), review the budget, address complaints about bus service, and provide recommendations to Metro management regarding the employment status of each sector general manager.

Communications between sectors and riders was poor, according to a report by the California State Auditor which was released one year into the new structure. In addition, each sector had its own scheduling, operations, and maintenance divisions, causing effort duplication, organizational silos, and inefficiency. Thus, in 2009, the sectors were eliminated, and transportation, maintenance, service planning, and administration were recentralized under the guidance of the MTA Chief Operations Officer. Governance councils, renamed service councils, now have more responsibility over local issues such as stop placement and service changes, while larger issues are handled by the MTA board.