High Turnover Leaves City Departments in Limbo

Mayor James K. Hahn is spending a lot of his time these days in job interviews.

An exodus of top managers from Los Angeles City Hall has left key departments in limbo and the mayor scurrying to plug holes in his administration.

The departure of 12 of the city’s 43 department heads this year has also become an issue in the mayor’s race, with challengers saying the high turnover is a reflection of Hahn’s poor management.

“Right now, City Hall under Jimmy Hahn is like a ship without a captain and is sailing aimlessly while everyone bails out to save themselves,” said Councilman Bernard C. Parks, a candidate for mayor.

State Sen. Richard Alarcon (D-Sun Valley), another candidate, chimes in: “The leader is only as strong as his team, and this much transition only adds to the weakness of this administration.”

Last week alone saw the final day on the payroll for Librarian Susan Kent, the abrupt resignation of Larry Keller as executive director of the Port of Los Angeles and the retirement announcement of City Clerk Mike Carey.

Nine city agencies, including the key departments of water and power, airports, harbor, animal regulation and the Housing Authority, have acting or interim general managers.

“The mood is not great,” said one department head who is also considering resignation. “I don’t have a lot of faith in this administration. The budget process with the mayor’s office this year was so adversarial.”

Carey, who is retiring after 37 years, said one factor affecting other managers could be a change in the City Charter that allowed the mayor to fire the heads of departments. Under the old charter, the mayor could remove a manager only if a majority of the City Council backed the move.

“That has created some additional stress,” Carey said, noting that his is one of a few top positions still under the old charter protections.

“We had far less turnover in past years,” Carey said. “There is a little more turmoil in this building than there used to be.”

In the case of the Department of Water and Power, the agency has had three general managers in seven months.

Deputy Mayor Doane Liu denied that the city’s management was in turmoil. “The work is getting done,” Liu said.

The mayor is moving to fill top posts, having met last week with finalists for general manager of the Animal Regulation Department, while screeners have whittled down the list of contenders to head the airports department.

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Lawmaker Acts in Wake of Talk-Show Pressure

Targeted for defeat by a pair of radio talk-show hosts who believe he is soft on immigration, Rep. David Dreier (R-San Dimas) introduced legislation last week aimed at getting tough at the U.S. border.

Dreier’s plan would add 700 new Border Patrol agents, set a $50,000 penalty for employers who fail to verify immigration status through a database, and require photos and computer strips on Social Security cards to guard against fraud by illegal immigrants.

The bill, dubbed the “Illegal Immigration Enforcement and Social Security Protection Act of 2004,” was filed just a month after KFI-AM radio hosts John Kobylt and Ken Chiampou selected Dreier for, as they delicately put it, a “political human sacrifice.”

The scary-sounding threat refers to plans by the radio duo to rally their large audience to vote Dreier out of office for what they see as his inaction on immigration problems.

Dreier denied his bill was a reaction to the threat from the radio agitators, adding, “This legislation gets to the root of that problem by adding tougher enforcement penalties to current law ...”

Instead, Dreier credited T.J. Bonner, president of the National Border Patrol Council, with inspiring the bill, going so far as to call it the “Bonner Plan.”

The “John and Ken Plan” apparently didn’t sound official enough.

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Shriver Finds Herself in Unfamiliar Territory

California’s first lady had a bewildering experience last week when she talked to a class of kindergartners at Mary Faye Elementary School at Camp Pendleton.

Maria Shriver introduced herself to the students as the wife of the current governor and found herself in an unfamiliar situation, according to a report filed by a reporter for the San Diego Union-Tribune.

“My husband is Arnold Schwarzenegger,” said Shriver. “Have you heard of him?”

The children said no and shook their heads.

“Oh, well, that is a first,” Shriver said.

A child in the back of the room asked, “Is he the president?”

Shriver told him no. “He used to be in movies -- ‘Kindergarten Cop,’ ‘Terminator.’ ”

The children had not heard of the movies.

“I’m loving this audience,” she told the adults in the room.

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Latino Political Leader Re-Registers as Green

California Democrats apparently aren’t sweating the loss of Nativo Lopez, head of the Mexican American Political Assn., who re-registered in Sacramento as a member of the Green Party.

Lopez, who leads the state’s oldest and largest Mexican American political organization, urged other Latino voters to re-register as Greens.

Democrats have taken the Latino vote for granted, he said. “We’re no better off than we were a generation ago,” he said.

Big money controls both major parties and “they do not want to wake the Latino voter up because they are afraid we will change the system,” he said.

State Democratic consultant Bob Mulholland noted that there were many Latino Democrats far more active in state politics than Lopez or any Green Party official -- such as Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante and party Chairman Art Torres.

“They can’t even get Ralph Nader to register as a Green,” he said of the independent presidential candidate, whose running mate is Green Party veteran Peter Camejo.

Nader and Camejo are on the ballot in 22 states and the District of Columbia, but not in California.

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Points Taken

* The Los Angeles City Council will hit the road a lot more if Councilman Greig Smith gets his way. Smith has introduced a motion requiring the council to meet at least twice each month in the San Fernando Valley after the Van Nuys City Hall renovation is complete. “San Fernando Valley residents should not feel excluded from city government by virtue of geography,” said Smith, who represents the northwest corner of the Valley.

* Sen. John F. Kerry presented the “Top 10 Bush Tax Proposals” on CBS’ “Late Show with David Letterman” last week. Two samples: “No estate tax for families with at least two U.S. presidents” and “Texas Rangers can take a business loss for trading Sammy Sosa.”

* The League of California Cities has elected Los Angeles City Council President Alex Padilla as first vice president of the statewide organization, putting him in line to possibly become president next year. That could raise his profile in the state and help set him up for a later run at state elected office, supporters said.

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You Can Quote Me.

“I’m not sure that Al Qaeda has Wyoming at the top of their list and certainly not now with all the homeland security money going there.”

-- Los Angeles Mayor James K. Hahn, complaining that the federal government allocates homeland security money equally among the 50 states, even though California has a much higher population and many more potential terrorist targets than smaller, rural states.

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Contributors this week include Times staff writer Jean O. Pasco.