City of Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti Becomes Chair of Metro’s Board of Directors
City of Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti has begun a new term as chair of the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority Board of Directors, the agency announced. He succeeds outgoing Board Chair John Fasana, Mayor Pro Tem of the city of Duarte.
In his second term as Chair of the Metro Board of Directors, Mayor Garcetti will focus on a three-pronged agenda: Build, Ride, and Plan. Build means moving forward with new transportation projects quickly and efficiently, and accelerating the plan to ease traffic, approved by County voters last year with the passage of Measure M. Ride means taking aggressive steps to improve the Metro rider experience. Plan means creating jobs and building thriving, healthy communities around the growing transit network.
“When voters passed Measure M, they gave us a mandate to build a better transportation system and a more connected region — now, we need to deliver,” said Mayor Garcetti. “I am honored to serve again as Chair of this board, and help build our network into a global model for public transportation infrastructure and service.”
Measure M will fund 40 transit and highway projects over the next 40 years and generate $860 million a year in sales tax revenues. The measure is expected to create more than 778,000 new jobs. Mayor Garcetti will work with Metro to create training programs that focus on economically disadvantaged communities in LA County, so that those jobs contribute to a strong local economy.
The next year is crucial for Metro’s agenda, as major projects under construction begin to take shape, including the Crenshaw/LAX Line, which is now 70 percent complete, the Regional Connector in downtown Los Angeles, and the Purple Line Extension subway beneath Wilshire Boulevard, which will run toward the Miracle Mile, Beverly Hills and Century City. Mayor Garcetti will also work together with other regions in Southern California like Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino Counties, because traffic does not stop at county borders.
The Mayor is also committed to collaborating with state and federal partners to leverage local funds. This effort will help ensure that cities are rewarded with federal funding if they generate their own money for infrastructure, so that the region can ease local traffic, and strengthen the nation’s transportation infrastructure at the same time.
That federal effort is based on the Infrastructure Incentive Initiative (I-3), which leverages federal funding by rewarding regions like Los Angeles for bringing their own infrastructure funding to the table, so that we can continue to innovate, and build projects that last.
The 13-member Board of Directors is comprised of the five Los Angeles County Supervisors, four members appointed by the Los Angeles County City Selection Committee and three members appointed by the Mayor of Los Angeles. The position of Board Chair rotates between the three groups. Mayor Garcetti will serve as the Board’s Chair through June 30, 2018.
