Closing the Cookie Jar

When members of the Los Angeles City Council sneaked through raises for themselves, the mayor, the city attorney and the city controller five months ago they violated the spirit of the law and the confidence that voters had placed in them.

One voter decided to fight City Hall over the raises that were, among other things, 10% rather than the 5% that the city Charter allows, and over the way they were approved. Dorothy Green, a civic activist, has won her lawsuit. Her success should reduce public cynicism and restore a little faith in the system.

Superior Court Judge Raymond Cardenas, who voided the ordinance, ruled that the Charter makes no provision for compounding raises even when the council declines to vote a raise for a year, which was the case in 1984. As for the argument that city officials are underpaid, the judge advised that the electorate should be persuaded to change the Charter.

Council members can make a case that they deserve a raise, but it must be a straightforward case. They rushed through the vote on the pay-raise ordinance, which was identified by number only instead of by topic, without the typical advance notice, public hearings or discussion and on a day when their own great dissenter, Ernani Bernardi, was scheduled to be off.

The hidden agenda of the Los Angeles City Council did not violate the open-meeting law, the judge ruled, but he said that it violated the spirit of that law--and the faith of many voters.