Remap Foes Suggest: Secede, Repeal or Sue : All three tactics are problematic; for example, under state law, the City Council must OK secession.

Although the Los Angeles City Council’s redistricting plan is already in effect, opponents have vowed to continue the fight on several fronts.

Their options include: reviving a dormant proposal that the San Fernando Valley secede from the city, asking voters to repeal the new council-district boundaries and going to court.

But there are problems with all three strategies.

The secession movement, which has its roots in a mid-1970s drive by some chambers of commerce to create a separate city and county in the Valley, flies in the face of a state law enacted to thwart it.

Jerry Hayes, president of the United Chambers of Commerce of the San Fernando Valley, said he plans to ask his group, which represents 7,500 businesses, to support secession.

The Sun Valley Chamber of Commerce has already passed a resolution supporting such a measure.

No one at City Hall, however, is taking secession talk very seriously.

In 1975, the Committee Investigating Valley Independent City/County (CIVICC), composed of taxpayers who felt the Valley did not receive its fair share of city services, initiated a movement to withdraw from the city and county of Los Angeles.

But, in 1978, the Legislature approved a law that requires approval by a city’s council before any section of that city can secede. One CIVICC member conceded at the time that the law was “the kiss of death” for such a movement.

“Secession is out of the question,” said Councilman Ernani Bernardi. Bernardi and Councilman Joel Wachs are the most vigorous opponents of the redistricting, which drastically alters their East Valley districts and removes most of their bases of support.

Hayes said the Chamber of Commerce group will not give up easily. He believes the law can be successfully challenged in court.

“The people on the other side of the hill now control Ventura Boulevard,” Hayes said.

Under the redistricting that took effect over the weekend, Councilmen Zev Yaroslavsky, John Ferraro and Michael Woo, all of whom represent districts whose areas are for the most part south of Mulholland Drive, have added sections of the Valley to their territory. Councilman Marvin Braude’s district continues to be split between the Valley and the Westside. Ventura Boulevard now meanders through the jurisdictions of five council members--Wachs, Ferraro, Woo, Braude and Yaroslavsky.

Bernardi said he prefers to fight the redistricting by appealing to voters. But the ballot-initiative strategy is not without its drawbacks.

An election will be held in the new, predominantly Latino 1st District downtown in January, before the initiative Bernardi proposes could appear on the ballot. If the initiative were later approved, the 1st District would be moved back to the late Councilman Howard Finn’s old northeast Valley district and the council member elected by the downtown voters would be assigned to that district.

What Bernardi proposes is to go back to the plan approved by the council July 31, before Finn’s sudden death on Aug. 12 led to the reopening of a bruising political battle over district boundaries. The council first redrew district boundaries to create a second predominantly Latino district, in response to a Justice Department suit. The other Latino district is Councilman Richard Alatorre’s in East Los Angeles.

Ferraro and Woo were the losers in that first redrawing because, to accommodate the new Latino district, they were placed in the same district and would have been forced to run against each other in the next regular election, in April.

1st District Divided

When Finn died, Ferraro and Woo persuaded the council to carve up Finn’s 1st District, dividing it between Bernardi and Wachs, and move the rest of the boundaries around to create a new, predominantly Latino 1st District near downtown. Although the plan spared Ferraro’s and Woo’s political bases, it drastically changed East Valley representation.

The possibility of a council member being assigned, rather than elected, to Finn’s old district is one reason Wachs has not decided whether to join the initiative drive, according to an aide.

Bernardi conceded that the residents of Finn’s old district could be assigned a council member they did not elect. But, he said, the district now has two council members it did not elect: himself and Wachs.

“They have me, and they haven’t elected me,” Bernardi went on. “I think the choice is between that and having the district the way they wanted. . . . That was their goal--to have their district.”

An initiative, he said, would at least return the 1st District to the Valley, where residents would be able to vote on a new council member in 1989.

Bernardi led a successful initiative campaign last year on campaign-finance reform, and he believes the ballot box is the best way to go on the redistricting fight, as well.

“We’re getting it ready,” Bernardi said Monday of his initiative campaign. He needs to gather 69,516 signatures by early November to put the issue before voters in the April municipal election.

No Easy Task

However, even if an initiative qualifies for the ballot, Bernardi would find it difficult to win citywide approval for the measure. A majority of votes citywide is needed for approval. Most of the opposition to the recent redistricting has come from a minority of voters, mostly residents of the East Valley, where the plan has the greatest effect.

Meanwhile, opponents of the redistricting plan also have been examining the possibility of challenging the plan in court. Bernardi and Wachs earlier hinted at violations of the state’s open-meeting law, the Brown Act, in the council’s preparation of the plan.

Supporters of the plan, however, have contended that, although they held preliminary discussions behind closed doors, the plan was eventually the subject of public hearings downtown and in the Valley.

Legal Action Costly

A court battle could be lengthy and costly and its outcome far from certain.

A similar complaint was made by a group of Wilshire-area homeowners in a challenge to an earlier redistricting approved by the council. However, the city attorney argued in papers filed in court that, even if the homeowners could prove violations of the Brown Act, such violations would not have invalidated the redistricting plan. The homeowners subsequently lost the case.