Gov. Gray Davis may be the most unpopular California governor since polls began charting such things and facing a historic recall election, but surveys have found that the Legislature has an even lower public standing.

The just-concluded 2002 legislative session provided ample evidence that lawmakers' poor image is more than justified.

Not only did the Legislature continue its irresponsible practice of papering over the budget deficit with creative bookkeeping maneuvers and billions of borrowed dollars, but it passed hundreds of bills with little justification other than special interest pressure and failed miserably to deal with issues that urgently need attention.
Even items that legislators are touting as successes, such as a partial overhaul of workers' compensation and a landmark expansion of health care for the working poor, were written in such haste at the end of the session that no one really knows whether their net impact will be positive or negative. They reflect the Legislature's penchant for voting in ignorance of effects -- such as the infamous energy "deregulation" bill passed in 1996.

What happened, and didn't happen, in the Capitol this year once again demonstrates that California suffers from a deepening crisis in governance. The nation's largest, richest and most complex state desperately needs a governor and a Legislature seriously engaged in land use, transportation, water, housing, medical care, education, and fiscal and economic matters. Instead, it has a political apparatus that is consumed with games of trivial pursuit and either oblivious or indifferent to the reality of what's happening in the state outside of Capitol Park.

The Capitol's decay is no secret to those who deal with it daily. Even the most jaded lobbyists and journalists shake their heads at how abysmally ineffective, insular, petty and systemically corrupted state government has become. And among themselves, they debate constantly the causes of this institutional disintegration, as well as its effects.

Term limits are a popular culprit, and probably share some of the blame. But a gerrymandered legislative redistricting is probably a greater factor in the recent decline, along with a lack of interest among much of the media, at least until the recall erupted, and an abdication of responsibility by the state's civic leadership.

No matter what happens on the Davis recall, the Legislature will remain, as now constituted and organized, incapable of functioning effectively. So we should be at least thinking about how it could be made better, with the alternatives divided roughly into two categories: deep changes that would be very difficult to effect and milder reforms that might be achievable.

The former reforms would require the state to start over from the top, rethinking the entire structure of state and local government in California and designing a system that made sense for its 21st-century reality. Were we to entertain a complete overhaul, we might consider such things as a parliamentary system, which would increase accountability; a one-house Legislature to lower impediments to action; a much-larger Legislature, which would bring lawmakers closer to local communities; the encouragement of multiple parties; and the reorganization of local governments along more multipurpose and regional lines.

None of that is likely to happen, so we must begin with the second category of procedural and semistructural reforms that might be achievable. A reasonable loosening of term limits -- 12 years in either house, for example -- would bring more stability without returning to oligarchic and autocratic rule, when one leader could proclaim himself as the "ayatollah of the Legislature." Redistricting should be taken out of the Legislature and given to an outside commission, which would design competitive districts that make sense for 35 million-plus Californians, not merely Capitol insiders. Primary elections should be opened up to all voters, including independents, to allow moderates to win office.

None of those changes, or the others that could be listed, would guarantee a more responsive and effective Legislature. But they have the potential to make things better -- while the current system can only make them worse.