Wendy Greuel discusses how gun violence affected her in new TV ad

In her first television ad in the runoff for mayor or Los Angeles, Wendy Greuel describes how gun violence has affected her and other Americans and promises Angelenos, “I’ll work so this never touches your life.”

Greuel uses the 30-second spot, due to begin running Monday on cable television, to pledge more mental health services and “a partnership with parents and police to keep guns and gangs out of schools.”

By raising the issue in her competition with City Councilman Eric Garcetti, Greuel seeks to align herself with a political stance—increased gun control and safety measures for children—that has become popular with most of the public since a gunman killed 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut four months ago.

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Universal registration and other gun control measures have been at the top of the national political agenda in recent days, as the U.S. Senate has taken up the issue. Greuel, the city controller, appeared at a rally Saturday in Westwood in favor of tougher regulation.

Greuel’s new advertisement puts a personal spin on the issue. “We all have our own Sandy Hook,” the candidate says at the start of the ad, suggesting that her personal revulsion at gun violence was first brought home by two incidents—a 1992 murder-suicide involving two employees at the San Fernando Valley building supply store owned by her family and a mass shooting at a Jewish day care center in Granada Hills in 1999.

Greuel grew up near the site of the day care center. She knew the employees who died early one morning before Frontier Building Supply Co. opened.

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“There are individuals who have been impacted on this issue,” Greuel said in an interview. “It’s about urging Congress on this issue and, for me, making sure our kids are safe and our communities are safe.”

Greuel said she was not contemplating a new source of revenue to improve mental health services. She said she believed Los Angeles could do a better job of attracting support for the mentally disturbed from the county, state and federal governments.

The candidate said that expansion of existing school programs—like the L.A.’s Best after school program—could help improve safety for children.

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james.rainey@latimes.com