P. Krakover, Top City Hall Lobbyist, Dies of Cancer at 51

Philip Krakover, a shrewd and genial lobbyist who worked mainly on behalf of local real estate developers, died Tuesday of cancer at 51.

After working as a city planner, Krakover started his business, Engineering Technology Inc. in 1963. It was a civil engineering firm that offered technical assistance and political advice to builders and developers. He said he started on a shoestring, a married father with $2,400 in the bank.

“I figured we could make it for five months on what we had,” he said.

By the early 1980s, Krakover’s firm had grown from a one-room office to the largest operation of its kind in the city.

He once said that his company did “millions and millions and millions of dollars” a year in business.

Could Afford Ferrari

He was successful enough to afford a Ferrari and to contribute several thousand dollars each year to the political officeholders who would decide whether to approve his clients’ often-controversial projects.

Krakover, with his ready smile, his cigar and his arm around a councilman, became an esteemed member of the council’s extended family of advisers and courtiers.

In a town where big money is still to be made in land, Krakover became one of a handful of people sought out by developers with the most ambitious and most provocative projects.

Krakover’s stock in trade was winning City Council approval for the kind of neighborhood high-rise office complex or hillside condominium that invite indignant editorials and incite caravans of livid home owners to descend on City Hall.

Critics said that Krakover and other lobbyists succeeded by buying votes, and the criticism led to the council’s 1985 passage of a law limiting, for the first time, the size of contributions that could be made to its members.

Scoffs at Fixer Image

Krakover scoffed at the image of the lobbyist as a fixer, though he did not dispute the power of the dollar in political circles. Money buys access not votes, goes the City Hall adage, and Krakover subscribed to it.

“Seeing people when I need to, . . . that is where my contributions are useful,” he said.

But Krakover and those who knew him said he had more going for him than money.

As a young city planner, he mastered the intricacies of the city’s arcane zoning code. He took that knowledge into private practice and, over time, public officials came to rely on his expertise and on his staff, which was full of people like him, who had learned their trade in the City Planning Department.

“I worked in almost every section of the Planning Department,” Krakover said. “I traced plans. I drew up new laws. I knew where the paper work went. I learned how things worked.”

Worked One on One

Folksy and a trifle awkward in front of a microphone, Krakover said he preferred working “one on one” in a council member’s office to orating in front of an audience.

But Krakover had one particularly memorable moment in the public eye.

It was four years ago. Krakover knew he had cancer. He had thought about retiring to Hawaii, he said, then rejected the idea. Instead he took on a new client, a contender for the $100-million East San Fernando Valley cable television franchise that the City Council was going to award that year.

His client, United Cable Television of Denver, looked like a loser. It was an out-of-town firm up against a local entry, East Valley Community Cable, that enjoyed the support of some of the city’s most well-connected lawyers and politicians. By the time United hired Krakover, it had been outspent by East Valley $150,000 to $21,000 in contributions to the city officials who would vote on the franchise. Council committees twice had rated East Valley the worthier firm.

Then, Krakover went to work. There was money spent. A $10,000 contribution to one councilman, a $10,000 loan to another. And there was Krakover’s brand of chutzpah.

‘David and Goliath’

“The reality of it was they are looking at me to be an army of one,” he said going in. “I expect it will be me against a whole rash of people. In a way, I kind of like it. It is like David and Goliath all over again.”

When it was over, key council members had switched their votes, and Krakover’s client had won.

“He is a nonpareil,” said Dan Shapiro, a lawyer who watched what happened that day and who had gone against Krakover in earlier battles.

On Wednesday, the City Council adjourned in Krakover’s memory.

There will be a service today at Hillside Memorial Park in Culver City. Memorials should be sent to the Friends of the Los Angeles Free Clinic.

Krakover is survived by his wife, Ann; his mother, Toby; two daughters, Elaine Wior and Denise Lyons, and two grandchildren.