NICK’S VIEW - Los Angeles needs purposeful, decisive leadership. Without it, the city risks sleepwalking into crisis. This city has produced both breakthroughs and breakdowns in executive leadership, and I have examined this in three different areas: disaster response, fiscal stewardship, and governance accountability.
Mayors in the Hour of Crisis:
Mayoral leadership is demanding, and a disaster makes it even more so. When a major crisis occurs the city’s familiar rhythms give way to urgency, every decision affects millions of lives, and every hesitation carries grave consequences.
Under such a situation, the mayor’s role extends beyond administration and becomes existential. Bureaucratic safeguards fall away, requiring immediate clarity, command, and moral courage. Every second counts.
During a crisis, residents instinctively turn to City Hall for direction. Leadership is measured by the mayor’s ability to cut through procedural confusion, coordinate isolated agencies, and make decisions with direct consequences for public safety.
To evaluate mayoral leadership, I compare two distinct disasters—the Palisades firestorm and the Northridge earthquake—each revealing a different aspect of governing under extreme pressure.
On January 7, 2025, after a weather event that has been highlighted several days before, the Palisades Fire and the Eaton Fire erupted, burned fifty-nine square miles, killed thirty-one people, and became one of the most destructive dual‑fire events in Los Angeles County history. The fires are often referred to collectively as twin infernos.
LA Mayor Karen Bass was in Ghana leading a U.S. presidential delegation when the fires began. Her absence during the critical early hours drew sharp public and political criticism, and she later acknowledged that traveling during a period of high wildfire risk was a mistake. Still, she said her administration and then-Fire Chief Kristin Crowley had not adequately warned her about the extreme Santa Ana winds before her departure.
Tensions between Bass and Crowley escalated when the fire chief publicly cited city budget cuts and understaffing as factors hindering the fire response. Bass disputed these claims, arguing that budget resources had increased, and subsequently removed Crowley from her leadership post. Crowley filed two lawsuits alleging the city retaliated against her in violation of the Labor Code and state Constitution.
On October 6, 2026, the former fire chief, now an assistant chief in the Valley Bureau, claimed she has become a political target — asserting that Bass has spent the mayoral campaign smearing her name, distorting facts, and weaponizing falsehoods about the Palisades fire response to shield her own political standing. Bass’ attorneys argue the lawsuits are an improper attempt to stifle public disclosure.
Regarding her actions on the fires, Bass asserts she focused efforts on emergency recovery, streamlining permitting for displaced residents, and securing federal disaster aid. During the recovery process, she publicly clashed with President Donald Trump over regulations, debris removal timelines, and clearance for residents returning to destroyed properties.
I have carefully examined the leadership role of the mayor, and the record suggests that she failed to project decisive leadership when Los Angeles needed it most. Indeed, her absence as the fires began—despite days of Red Flag warnings—became emblematic of a broader leadership failure.
Her return to LA did not immediately restore confidence: communication remained uneven, command appeared fragmented, and key agencies lacked the clear, centralized direction a major disaster requires.
The fire chief’s dismissal deepened concerns about transparency and accountability rather than demonstrating strength. As rebuilding lagged and residents grew frustrated, even supporters acknowledged that the mayor’s response to the fires lacked urgency.
In my view, these are signs of a mayor reacting to crisis rather than directing it. She faces justified criticism for failing to provide the steady, forceful leadership needed to restore normalcy after the fires. At a time when Los Angeles urgently needed direction, her administration drifted and hesitated instead of asserting the executive command required to stabilize a traumatized city.
Mayor Richard Riordan, just six months on the job, was jolted out of bed at 4:31 a.m. when the 6.7-magnitude Northridge earthquake struck. He found himself on his back on the carpeted floor of his Bel Air home. He tried to call the police and fire chiefs, but the lines were dead. Even the mobile phone in his Ford Explorer did not work.
In my book, "The Making of Modern Los Angeles", I described how the frustrated mayor hurriedly dressed in a gray sweatsuit and running shoes and scurried off for City Hall, eighteen miles away. The hasty drive was perilous because roads and bridges were damaged and confused drivers scrambled for safe routes.
When he finally arrived, he parked in the City Hall garage and rushed to the Emergency Operations Center—a bunker-like quarters four floors below ground where some tousled department heads were gathering. He was surprised by the lack of personnel and equipment. Worse of all, there was no real plan on how to respond. Wooden tables with rotary phones were set up and paper maps were pinned to the wall. Only a few television sets were available.
He noticed that Police Chief Willie Williams was nowhere to be found. The chief’s wife had panicked because falling furniture almost hit her, Riordan was told. The mayor directed a staffer to pick him up and drive him to the Operations Center as fast as possible.
Riordan immediately declared a local state of emergency, which granted his office broad emergency authority to deploy resources, bypass routine procurement laws, and streamline inter-agency coordination.
When bureaucratic rules threatened to delay emergency operations, he waived standard contracting procedures. This enabled city crews and private contractors to begin clearing debris, repairing water mains, and stabilizing structures within hours instead of weeks. When transportation officials told him that a critical detour around a collapsed freeway would take two weeks because Culver City approvals were needed, Riordan gave them 10 minutes to take over the intersections and said: “It is much easier to ask for forgiveness than to get permission."
Within hours after the earthquake, Pres. William Clinton called Riordan and the mayor engaged directly with the President to secure federal assistance. Clinton directed John Emerson, President Clinton`s deputy director of intergovernmental affairs, James Lee Witt, director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Federico Peña, secretary of transportation, and Henry Cisneros, secretary of Housing and Urban Development, to fly to Los Angeles immediately.
Riordan’s relationship with the federal government during Northridge was instantaneous, direct, and operational. He was in the city, on the ground, and in active communication with the President.
The Santa Monica Freeway, one of the nation’s busiest, lay in ruins. Although engineers initially projected months of closure, Riordan rejected that timeline and pressed Caltrans, state engineers, and contractors to accelerate reconstruction by offering bonuses for early completion. The destroyed section of the I‑10 reopened in 66 days—a national record for post‑disaster freeway reconstruction.
As I wrote in my book, two days after the earthquake, Clinton arrived, aboard Air Force One in Burbank. “This is a national problem,” he said. “We have a national responsibility, and we will be in it for the long run. This is not something where all of us from the federal government just showed up while this is an issue in the headlines.”
Riordan’s actions in a catastrophic moment are widely cited as the defining success of his administration and a classic blueprint for municipal crisis management.
Leadership failures at LADWP:
The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power is the nation’s largest municipal utility. On April 19, 2024, Mayor Bass appointed Janisse Quinones as the department’s chief executive officer and chief engineer. In my view, the appointment was ill-advised. Quinones lacked the experience and history to lead an organization of this scale and had no background in water management. I believe these shortcomings contributed to the catastrophic failures during the Palisades fires, which killed twelve people and destroyed 6,873 structures.
The Emergency Management System was not activated until noon of the day of the fires, by the inexperienced general manager, who personally had taken control of it.
LADWP failed to prepare for a weather event forecast several days before intense winds reached the city. Its water and power systems did not declare emergencies until noon on the day the fires began, leading to cascading failures. Preparations should have started days earlier, with personnel and equipment deployed to fire-prone areas immediately.
When the area’s three large water tanks ran dry and triggered alarms at LADWP headquarters, no one responded. LADWP should have deployed temporary water tankers to refill them.
With proper preparation, LADWP personnel could have been stationed in the area to monitor events. For example, when a fire destroyed a block of homes, melted water meters leaked and reduced water pressure on nearby streets. An employee on site could identify the problem and shut off water to the affected block.
LADWP crews did not position large water tankers near fire engines to provide a reliable water supply. Firefighters wasted time connecting to hydrants with little or no pressure; personnel on the ground should have directed them to hydrants with adequate pressure.
Unlike other major Southern California utilities, LADWP does not proactively shut off power. Leaving power lines energized made firefighting more difficult and dangerous. Coordination between LADWP and LAFD was nonexistent because management was slow to activate emergency protocols, a fatal mistake.
Compounding the problem, the Palisades faced a citywide failure to maintain and replace utility poles. Because the area is at high risk for fire, pole replacement should have been prioritized. Many local poles were more than 65 years old, and the pole at the center of a lawsuit was erected in 1929.
In 2019, a city controller’s report concluded that “the department must address aging infrastructure in high fire-risk areas.” It warned that “maintenance backlogs of poles can increase the likelihood of equipment contributing to a fire ignition” and identified the Palisades as “most exposed to fire dangers.” By 2023, more than half of LADWP’s poles were over 60 years old, and the California Public Utilities Commission had recorded 9,000 pole-inspection violations.
Concerns about inadequate maintenance intensified after downed LADWP wires electrocuted a father and daughter, resulting in a $38 million settlement. The live wires fell after a power crossarm—previously inspected and approved by LADWP—failed. The City Council later approved a motion stating, “This tragedy led to an uncovering of a faulty inspection process which incorrectly categorized thousands of power poles as passing safety inspections when in fact those power poles were in violation of such safety standard.”
Another of Quinones` failures was the fact that the 117 million gallons Santa Ynez reservoir in Palisades was empty when the fires hit, waiting for repairs to the floating cover. Quinones should have awarded a contract to repair the cover by bypassing the bidding process under emergency conditions, considering the cost of $261,000 for the repairs was well under her authority.
Quinones` leadership and management were not transparent and inclusive. For example, while for more than one hundred years, LADWP`s Power System delivered electricity efficiently with clear accountability and streamlined leadership, Quinones split divisions and added multiple executives, thereby reducing accountability and increasing personal gain at the public`s cost.
The runaway management scheme was implemented through deliberate and coordinated action. Quinones along with top three Power System executives, facilitated the restructuring of a successful system by engaging in informal arrangements with selected senior executives, thereby bypassing standard processes for transparency, oversight and public accountability. As result, internal controls were diminished, oversight was reduced, and decisions became less subject to external review, even bypassing the board of directors.
Until this year, the Power System typically operated with eight directors overseeing the planning, engineering, new business, construction, operations, maintenance and safety of the electrical grid. The organization exploded to sixteen directors and included nine newly created Electric Services Managers and three newly created Power Engineering Managers.
The reorganization obligates ratepayers to fixed costs: $236.4 million over 10 years, $472.8 million over 20 years, and $709.2 million over 30 years, excluding potential raises.
These are leadership failures that cannot be allowed to continue, resulting in massive destruction of the city.
Leadership failures at Los Angeles World Airports:
John Ackerman was appointed by the mayor to lead Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA) on December 7, 2023.
In my view, Ackerman was ill-suited to oversee LAX’s $30 billion expansion, including the multibillion transportation project, the Automated People Mover (APM). He lacked construction experience and, as a result, failed to hold the contractor, construction manager, and consultants accountable. Nor did he seek guidance from experts in large-scale transportation projects.
As a result, LAWA faces billions of dollars in change orders, delays, and repair costs stemming from substandard construction. Contractors have proceeded haphazardly on the APM, exploiting Ackerman’s limited construction experience and authority. The project is already $1.1 billion over budget and three years behind schedule, with costs likely to rise further.
LINXS, the public-private joint venture selected to design, build, finance, operate, and maintain the APM, has shown little cooperation or good faith, used questionable negotiating tactics, and repeatedly missed key milestones. A global settlement added $550 million to the budget and set completion for December 8, 2025, with service beginning in January 2026. The opening has since been delayed to January 2027, with no assurance that the new deadline will be met.
Having been called on to "fix" several major infrastructure projects plagued by cost overruns and serious delays, I have found a common cause: a lack of trust between the client and contractor. Press reports make clear that this trust is absent between LAWA and LINXS—a fatal flaw.
Like private companies, LAWA and other public agencies should bar consultants and contractors responsible for this deeply flawed project from LAWA work for three years, signaling that deficient performance will not be tolerated.
LINXS is the consortium delivering the 2.25‑mile elevated train linking LAX terminals to the new rental‑car center, economy parking, and Metro transit connections. I would prefer that the joint venture be identified by its member companies’ names.
Having explored the good and bad side of governance, the answer to my query on leadership is that Los Angeles cannot afford leaders who merely hold office. It needs leaders who can govern. Choosing them—at the ballot box and within City Hall—is not simply prudent, but the best defense against the failures that arise when no one is truly in charge.
(Nick Patsaouras is an electrical engineer, civic leader, and a longtime public advocate. He ran for Mayor in 1993 with a focus on rebuilding L.A. through transportation after the 1992 civil unrest. He has served on major public boards, including the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, Metro, and the Board of Zoning Appeals, helping guide infrastructure and planning policy in Los Angeles. He is the author of the book "The Making of Modern Los Angeles.")
