Hot Race for City Attorney Shaping Up

Weeks of behind-the-scenes politicking over which of two city posts three well-financed lawyers would run for ended Monday with all three opting to try to become Los Angeles’ city attorney.

As Monday’s deadline for declaring their intentions in the April 9 primary neared, Controller James Hahn and attorneys Lisa Specht and Murray Kane remained on the list of candidates to replace Ira Reiner. Reiner left the city attorney’s office last month to become Los Angeles County district attorney, paving the way for what promises to be one of the spring’s most hotly contested races.

Dozens of candidates filed for a host of other nonpartisan jobs ranging from mayor and eight City Council seats and three seats each on the Los Angeles Board of Education and on the Los Angeles Community Colleges Board of Trustees.

Among the scores of candidates seeking political office are 20 who will try to defeat Mayor Tom Bradley’s bid for a fourth term. Councilman John Ferraro, Bradley’s most prominent opponent, filed his declaration Monday.

Two former Board of Education foes, Julian Nava and Richard Ferraro, filed for Office No. 2 on the community college board, challenging incumbent Arthur Bronson. Former community college trustee J. William Orozco filed for Office No. 6 against incumbent Wallace Albertson. Lindsay Conner could face six opponents in her reelection bid for Office No. 4.

Sixteen people filed for the school board seat being vacated by Tom Bartman, including university professor David Armor, a controversial school desegregation expert. Incumbent Roberta Weintraub could face four opponents, and one person filed against Alan Gershman.

The list of official candidates will not be complete until final nominating papers are filed by noon Feb. 2.

The race for city attorney witnessed a dash of political intrigue even before filing for the office began last week. Backers of Hahn, Specht and Kane accused each other of trying to thwart their candidates’ bids to become city attorney by arguing that the best--and safest--course was to run for the controller’s office.

The campaign for the nonpartisan city attorney’s office will pit not only three well-financed Democrats (each has raised $200,000) against each other, but also two heavyweight Democratic institutions.

The longtime downtown moderate-to-liberal alliance, which supports Hahn, will go against Specht’s backers, who tend to be Westside liberals, including Democratic National Chairman Charles Manatt. Specht is a a partner in Manatt’s politically potent Westside law firm, Manatt, Phelps, Rothenberg and Tunney.

In addition, Specht has enlisted the successful campaign organization of Michael Berman and Carl D’Agostino, and Hahn has hired Joe Trippi, Walter Mondale’s California campaign director, to manage his race. Other former Mondale campaign staffers who will be assisting Hahn include pollster Patrick Caddell and Michael Ford.

Among the six who filed for city attorney was Deputy City Atty. Charles Zinger, who ran four years ago.

It is against this backdrop of a potentially expensive and divisive three-way battle for the post that talks began in earnest weeks ago among the backers for the three well-financed Democratic candidates over the choice of offices to seek. In a way, it was a replay of 1981, when Hahn wanted to run for city attorney but was steered toward the controller’s seat by backers of then-controller Reiner.

Influential Democratic backers of Specht, according to Hahn’s father, veteran county Supervisor Kenneth Hahn, tried two weeks ago to persuade the younger Hahn to seek reelection to a second term rather than file for city attorney.

But James Hahn, also a Democrat, said he would not bow to what he described as “pressure.”

Kenneth Hahn said he met two weeks ago with a key Specht backer, attorney and political strategist Mickey Kantor.

“It was suggested to me that Jimmy ought to run for reelection (as controller),” Kenneth Hahn said. “(Kantor said) ‘We’re going to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars (for Specht) and we have all the money we’ll need.’ ”

Hahn called Kantor’s comments “old-fashioned intimidation” and said that he then suggested to Kantor that Specht follow his son’s political path and run first for city controller and later for city attorney.

Kantor would offer no details about his meeting with Kenneth Hahn other than to confirm that it had occurred.

“I indicated to him that Lisa was going to run, and that’s all I want to say about it,” Kantor said.

Account Termed Inaccurate Specht, asked about the Hahn-Kantor meeting, said she did not want to discuss it other than to say that Hahn’s account “was not exactly” what she understood had transpired.

Meanwhile, Kane, attorney for the city’s Redevelopment Agency, said that several Hahn supporters tried to persuade him to run for controller so Hahn would have a better shot at becoming city attorney. James Hahn denied the allegation.

There were few surprises in the other city races as all eight incumbent City Council members whose terms are up filed for reelection. Attracting the most opposition were council members Gilbert Lindsay and Peggy Stevenson, who could face up to seven challengers each. Among Stevenson’s opponents is Michael Woo, who forced her into a runoff four years ago. No one filed against Zev Yaroslavsky.

Eleven candidates have declared their intention to seek the controller’s post that Hahn will vacate to run for city attorney. Among the candidates are financial executive Stephen Weeks and Democratic activist Alice Travis, defeated by Hahn in 1981, and community college board member Rick Tuttle.