Leader of NAACP Ties Racism Hike to Administration

Attacks and discrimination against blacks have increased both locally and nationally in recent years, the president of the Los Angeles chapter of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People said Thursday.

Raymond L. Johnson blamed the attitude of the Reagan Administration for an upswing of “bigotry in ideas, thoughts and actions by many individuals in society today.” The Administration, he charged, is “doing very little to correct the problem.”

Johnson made his remarks at a press conference marking the NAACP’s 78th birthday. He said racial attacks in Los Angeles have not received the publicity given those in the Howard Beach area of New York or Forsyth County, Ga., but that victims here have included a black student at UCLA and black citizens abused physically or verbally by law enforcement officers.

A UCLA spokeswoman said she knew of no such incident within the last four years. Cmdr. William Booth of the Los Angeles Police Department said he knew of nothing to substantiate the “significant increase” in incidents claimed by Johnson. Booth said community relations officers would contact Johnson for particulars in the incidents.

A Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department spokesman, Deputy Pete Fosselman, said there could be no comment because there were no specific allegations.

Johnson said that for the last two years the NAACP has been receiving 10 to 12 complaints a day of discrimination in employment. He said that was a 40% increase compared to previous years.

The California Department of Fair Employment and Housing was not available to substantiate that figure because state offices were closed for Lincoln’s Birthday. Although county offices were not closed, no official of the Los Angeles County Human Relations Commission could be reached for comment Thursday afternoon.

Johnson’s contention was shared by the national Urban League, which recently issued an annual report declaring that black Americans face high unemployment, poverty, the erosion of past gains and “a resurgence of raw racism” as a result of Reagan Administration social and economic policies.

U.S. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) said much the same thing last week, prompting Assistant U.S. Atty. Gen. William Bradford Reynolds, the Reagan Administration’s chief civil rights enforcer, to maintain that racist incidents such as those at Howard Beach and in Forsyth County are actually less prevalent than previously.