Ferraro Avoids Bradley Showdown : Decides Not to Confront Mayor at Valley Party Meeting

Guerrilla warfare is not Los Angeles City Councilman John Ferraro’s political style. So he settled an argument within his staff Saturday by refusing to stage an unscheduled public confrontation with Mayor Tom Bradley.

The episode illustrated a major dilemma of the Ferraro campaign: The underdog councilman and his aides can’t figure out how to force the mayor into a series of debates that would give Ferraro badly needed public exposure.

Unhappy with Bradley’s refusal to engage in the six televised debates that Ferraro has proposed, the councilman’s press secretary, Sandi Conlon, had suggested springing a surprise on the mayor at a meeting Saturday of the San Fernando Valley Democratic Party at Carpenters’ Hall in Van Nuys.

With Bradley scheduled for a 9 a.m. appearance and Ferraro due to speak at noon, Conlon proposed that the councilman show up three hours early and force the mayor into a debate.

High-Risk Format

Ron Smith, Ferraro’s campaign manager, loves a fight but did not like this particular high-risk format, a meeting in front of Democratic activists who tend to be longtime Bradley backers.

“We decided it either would be successful or would be a mess,” Smith said. The final decision was made by Ferraro. “John didn’t feel it would be appropriate,” Smith said.

Long-shot candidates occasionally use the sudden acts of harassment favored by guerrilla fighters--although nonviolent ones--as they battle for attention or try to energize downcast supporters.

A famous example occurred 14 years ago when Democrat Jesse M. Unruh, engaged in a hopeless contest against Republican Gov. Ronald Reagan, held a press conference in front of the home of one of Reagan’s wealthy supporters, Henry Salvatori. It became more guerrilla theater than guerrilla warfare when Salvatori and his wife, dressed in tennis clothes, confronted the Unruh entourage.

Ferraro has been trying to force Bradley into more debates ever since the campaign began, and on Saturday Ferraro began his speech to the San Fernando Valley Democrats by saying: “Tom Bradley does not want to debate me.”

One debate is scheduled. It will be held at 8 p.m. March 14 under the sponsorship of the League of Women Voters.

Smith complained that the debate site, a San Fernando Valley hotel, will all but eliminate the chance for live television coverage because it would be too expensive for the stations to set up their equipment.

Mike Gage, Bradley’s campaign manager, replied that Ferraro’s proposal of six debates--to be held in television studios--was “ludicrous.”

He said the League of Women Voters had told him there was a possibility of live television coverage at the Valley site and that three radio stations--KABC, KNX and KFWB--had said they would broadcast the debate live.

Asked if Bradley is avoiding debates to prevent Ferraro from gaining exposure, Gage said:

“Ferraro had a forum for 18 years in the City Council to have his positions well-known. If his positions are not well-known, that’s not my fault.”

With no confrontation, the two candidates spent their separate appearances Saturday appealing to constituencies important to their chances.

Bradley, aware of the concerns of his Van Nuys audience, sought to quell fears that the San Fernando Valley had been deprived of police officers to create a special task force to control violent crime in a South-Central Los Angeles housing project.

Bradley said the officers temporarily assigned to the task force came from all over the city and “anyone who would suggest that this is a robbing of the Valley is either deliberately misleading you or attempting to do so.”

Ferraro has said that Bradley favored South-Central Los Angeles over the Valley in creating the task force.

Ferraro spoke of his Democratic Party credentials, trying to assure the party activists that he is a strong Democrat even though many of his main backers are Republicans.

He said that he had worked for Harry S. Truman’s presidential campaign in 1948 and was an official on the Southern California campaign committee for John F. Kennedy in 1960. “My political background is steeped with the ideals of the Democratic Party,” Ferraro said.