4 Ex-Police Chiefs Give Backing to Ferraro

Four former Los Angeles police chiefs endorsed Councilman John Ferraro for mayor Friday, while one of them, State Sen. Ed Davis (R-Valencia), called Mayor Tom Bradley “an unloving parent” to the Police Department.

Davis said Bradley, a retired police lieutenant, “never had the capacity to really appreciate and love his Police Department.” Davis made his remarks at a press conference in front of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Parker Center with Ferraro and former Chiefs Tom Reddin, Roger Murdock and Robert Rock.

Davis, serving as spokesman for the four former chiefs, said he is opposing Bradley because he “had to fight” Bradley to get Police Department budget requests passed. When Bradley was a councilman and chairman of the Finance Committee, Davis said, “There’s nothing we went for that he didn’t cut down.”

June Ballot Measure

Bradley is supporting a June ballot measure that would increase the average property tax bill by about $58 a year to hire another 1,000 police officers. Ferraro has floated a plan that, he says, would increase the force by 1,300 without a tax increase, a plan that has been attacked by Bradley as “fantasy.”

Davis said Ferraro’s plan “may not make it without a tax increase,” but that he would prefer the tax-free effort over Bradley’s plan. But, he added, “I would support any plan that would add to the Police Department.”

The Police Protective League, which represents the bulk of rank-and-file police officers, supports the tax plan pushed by Bradley, although the league has not endorsed a candidate for mayor.

Davis and Reddin said that Ferraro, a former police commissioner, “understands the needs” of the department. Davis said Ferraro has “always been supportive” without “giving us a blank check.”

A Times study of Bradley’s and Ferraro’s record on police funds, however, determined that there is no dramatic difference between the two candidates. While Ferraro has tended in his 18 years on the council to side with the police chief’s budget requests, he also has voted only once against city budgets that for the most part where shaped by Bradley.

In response to Davis’ remarks and the endorsement, Steve Montiel, Bradley’s campaign spokesman, said the mayor “has given us the best Police Department in the country.” Montiel downplayed the importance of the endorsements, saying that Davis and Reddin have “partisan political axes to grind.” Davis is running as a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, and Reddin ran unsuccessfully against Bradley for mayor in 1973.

Gates Staying Neutral

Police Chief Daryl F. Gates was not involved in the Ferraro endorsement because “Chief Gates has made it clear his intention to stay neutral in this race, and I respect that,” Ferraro said. Gates’ press aide, Lt. Dan Cooke, did speak to the former chiefs after the press conference, but he stressed that it was “social and unofficial.”

When further questioned after the conference, Davis said he believed that the black mayor’s “inability to express love and support” toward the department may be rooted in the mayor’s LAPD experiences “when the department was segregated, when black and white men could not ride in the same patrol car. “