The Region - News from May 24, 1987

The team of whiz kids from John Marshall High School who won the U.S. Academic Decathlon turned the tables on the City Council during an awards ceremony and gave the officials a quiz they nearly flunked. Out of six questions posed by the 11-member Marshall team, the council answered only three correctly. City Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky scored the highest, giving correct answers to the two questions: What is the overall percentage of times Congress has overridden a presidential veto (5%), and what are the grounds for which a president can be impeached? (High crimes and misdemeanors.) A fourth question about police powers was answered correctly by Tony Radavich, a Los Angeles Police Department officer who stands guard during council meetings. “I would give the council a ‘D’ and the police officer an ‘A,’ ” said student Ethan McKinney.