Quinn Likely to Head New Bradley Effort to Capture Governor’s Chair

Tom Quinn, who helped manage Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr. to the governorship, is expected to be chairman of Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley’s gubernatorial campaign, while Deputy Mayor Tom Houston has decided against a top campaign post and will remain in City Hall, where he has worked to give the veteran mayor a more vigorous new image.

The Times Friday learned of these developments as Bradley’s expected second race against Republican Gov. George Deukmejian began taking shape.

Houston said in an interview that while Bradley has not definitely made up his mind to run, he is “certainly moving in that direction. Has he made an absolute decision? No. But the ducks are being put on line.”

Quinn, the Times learned, is expected to take the same role he had in Bradley’s successful fourth term mayoral race earlier this year--chairman, with a strong hand in day-to-day supervision.

Declines Confirmation

However, while Bradley sources said Quinn is expected to be named chairman, Quinn, in an interview, declined to say whether he will take the job. “The mayor must make a decision,” he said. “I would have to finalize that with him. When the mayor reaches that decision I am sure I will be active” if Bradley runs. But as of now, Quinn said, “it is not accurate to state at this time that I will be his campaign chairman.”

Quinn, a radio station owner, also owns City News Service, a news service for Los Angeles area papers and broadcast stations.

Ever since Houston joined the mayor as deputy mayor in 1984, there has been speculation among Bradley supporters and other participants in politics that he would run a Bradley gubernatorial campaign.

Houston, who had been head of the state Fair Political Practices Commission and a practicing attorney before coming to work for Bradley, said Bradley had offered him a choice of remaining as deputy mayor or becoming campaign manager. Houston said he also discussed the matter with Quinn. In past Bradley campaigns, the chairman has been overall supervisor, while the manager handled day-to-day operations.

‘Best That I Stay Here’

“I talked to the mayor at 3 p.m. today (Friday) and told him I thought it was best that I stay here,” Houston said. “Emotionally I would like to do it but rationally there is too much going on here.”

Houston’s decision to remain a powerful figure in City Hall meshes with a strategy employed since he arrived--pushing new and sometime controversial city policies that would be a political plus for Bradley and would give him an image of youthful effectiveness, despite his age, 69. In the past, Bradley had been criticized, even by friends, as a passive mayor, reluctant to initiate policies.

With Houston as his deputy, Bradley became a strong advocate, for example, of city pension funds divesting themselves of stocks and bonds in firms doing business with South Africa--a policy that pitted the mayor against some city employee unions concerned about the safety of their retirement funds.

His City Hall job, Houston said, “is going to take a lot of time, a lot of concentration on big issues.”

In addition, Houston said, he wants to remain as deputy mayor to try to guard against City Hall mishaps that Deukmejian could use against Bradley. “We don’t want to make any mistakes,” he said.

Farrakhan Speech

That comment came after what friend and foe considered a major Bradley mistake--his refusal to criticize Black Muslim minister Louis Farrakhan until after Farrakhan’s speech last Saturday night. Jewish groups, angry with Farrakhan’s repeated anti-Semitic speeches, had asked Bradley to speak out before the speech and many Jewish leaders criticized him for waiting. Bradley waited because he pledged to black leaders that he would delay a comment in an attempt to see if Farrakhan would moderate his remarks.

Houston said he will be involved in the gubernatorial campaign, despite his decision. “I will be spending every weekend and evening, except when my kids are here,” said Houston, a divorced man whose children visit him in Los Angeles every other weekend.

Quinn first won a reputation as an expert in use of radio and television for political campaigns as an adviser to Brown.

After Brown was elected governor, Quinn served as head of the California Air Resources Board. He also advised Brown on politics during the governor’s presidential campaigns.