Sister City at Heart of Beverly Hills Family Spat

The matter was presented by new Mayor Charlotte Spadaro as an urgent resolution requiring action before the opening of the Cannes Film Festival early next month.

The resolution was passed 4 to 1, but former Mayor Edward I. Brown, whose term on the council had expired moments earlier, said in an interview that there are serious questions about the propriety of the action.

Brown said the public, the Chamber of Commerce and other groups should have had a chance to discuss the issue, which came up at the end of a ceremonial meeting largely devoted to promises of harmony and cooperation.

Spadaro said there was nothing untoward about the proposal, which was first raised three years ago.

Idea Recently Renewed

She said the mayor of Cannes recently renewed the idea, and that it had to be submitted Tuesday night because Brown had blocked it for months.

While Cannes authorities have invited a Beverly Hills delegation to attend the festival, which opens May 8, Spadaro said no plans have been made to attend.

She said she had been thinking about going to the festival “to smooth things over” even if the proposal was defeated, but that foreign travel has become a risky matter given the threat of terrorism.

“Now the gesture of friendship has been made,” she said. “My role has not been determined. We have not yet made any plans.”

She said the issue was raised Tuesday night because the Council will not have another formal meeting until May 6, two days before the festival opens.

Salter Opposed

New council member Maxwell Hillary Salter denounced the action and voted against it, winning loud cheers from the capacity audience when he protested that France had refused to allow American bombers to fly over its territory on their way to attack targets in Libya.

“By endorsing this resolution we are saying to the government of France, ‘You can do anything you want to the government of the United States and we in Beverly Hills are not a part of the United States, so you go ahead and do it,” he said.

He also protested that the text of the resolution was handed to council members at the last minute, asking, “What’s the urgency? Is there a flood? Is the roof falling in?”

But Spadaro told him, “A week ago you and I discussed this matter. This is not the first you’ve heard of it.”

The two sparred for several minutes, with Salter appealing to the mayor to “let me finish” and Spadaro urging him to be brief because “the audience is tired and it’s warm in here.”

Veteran city officials said it was the first such exchange on a normally placid inauguration night in at least 30 years.

Period of Debate

The squabble indicated that the Beverly Hills Council is in for a period of active debate, with Salter, a semi-retired garment merchandiser, and newly installed colleague Robert K. Tanenbaum, a lawyer, adding new spice to its deliberations.

“I ‘d like to call on the disenfranchised, the disaffected, the disenchanted who came to these chambers pleading for what was most precious to them, preserving the integrity of their neighborhoods, to come back,” Tanenbaum said in his inaugural address.

He said members of the public would be allowed to speak at the beginning of council meetings instead of at the end of the agenda, “and if you have to repeat what your neighbor already said, that’s OK.”

In her last speech as a member of the council, Annabelle Heiferman added some spice of her own, thanking colleagues for their tributes, “some sincere, some insincere.”

Given a chance to run her campaign differently, she said, she would have changed her position on the unrestricted gift of municipal funds to the city’s beleaguered school system, which she had opposed.

Factors in Defeat

Without naming her, she suggested that Spadaro contributed to her electoral defeat by arguing in council meetings that a direct gift of city funds would leave members open to lawsuits.

“One council member, who is an attorney, planted a seed about personal liability,” she said. “This seed was not only planted but watered and fertilized, that we would be at risk. I’m sorry I allowed that kind of thinking to impact my thinking.”

In her inaugural address, Spadaro said she would meet Wednesday with school officials to resume negotiations that are expected to increase city support for the schools without posing the legal risks involved in making an outright gift.

She said she will ask the Planning Department to come up with a master plan to help bring the city into the 21st Century, based on recommendations now being prepared by several citizens’ committees.

While she has spoken in the past against several development proposals, Spadaro urged better communication between the City Council and the business community.

“I have heard it said that many developers steer clear of Beverly Hills,” she said. “In some cases, that may be fortunate for us, and in some cases, that may not be fortunate for us, because although we must strenuously hold the line against overdevelopment, renovation and rejuvenation are acceptable and even to be sought after.”

Spadaro is a former president of the Beverly Hills Unified School Board. She was voted out of office after fellow board members urged her defeat in 1983, but returned to political life with her election to the City Council in 1984.