‘Grinch’ Who Tried to Ban Yule in West Hollywood to Become Mayor

Juggling his appointment calendar, a pen and the mobile telephone in his silver-gray Saab that bears a license plate reading W HLYWD, City Councilman Alan Viterbi finally acknowledged that he could not take notes and drive at the same time. “Let me pull over so I don’t kill a constituent,” Viterbi said during a telephone conversation. “This is the only time I have to return calls.”

Viterbi’s juggling act also includes holding down a full-time job and membership on the boards of a synagogue and two groups devoted to providing housing for the elderly. And on Monday, Viterbi will become the city’s new mayor.

Viterbi, 25, is “one of the youngest public officials in the state of California and no doubt one of the busiest,” as his resume puts it.

He found enough support among senior citizens, gays, Russian immigrants, Orthodox Jews, aspiring young professionals and other groups to win the second highest number of votes in the city’s first election 2 1/2 years ago.

When he takes up the gavel, Viterbi will become the city’s fourth mayor and the first who is not a homosexual. The mayor’s post is rotated among council members.

He said the issue of sexual orientation is not significant today in the city that was once called “gay Camelot.”

Citing the establishment of tough rent control, strict rules against discrimination in hiring practices and a drop in crime statistics, Viterbi said “what we’ve accomplished in West Hollywood so far has made (homosexuality) a non-issue.”

Although much of the city’s initial fame two years ago focused on the political strength of its gay community, which makes up an estimated 25% to 40% of the population, the major issue since incorporation has been rent control.

And with the completion of a draft of the city’s first blueprint for future development, planning issues are expected to take the spotlight, elected officials and community activists agreed.

“This is far from being a gay Camelot,” said Bob Craig, publisher of Frontiers, a biweekly publication based in West Hollywood that appeals largely to the homosexual community.

He said the dream of a model city run by gays was tarnished by the conviction of West Hollywood’s first mayor, Valerie Terrigno, on charges of misusing government funds in an earlier job.

Since then, the election of Abbe Land as Terrigno’s replacement on the council put gays in the minority on the five-member council, but Craig said “there is still more opportunity in the city of West Hollywood for gays to become involved in the municipal process than anyplace I can think of.”

He said Viterbi “has always been very much a friend of the gay community.”

Less Notoriety

According to Stephen Schulte, the city’s outgoing mayor and Viterbi’s closest ally on the council, West Hollywood is “distinctive and something of a curiosity from time to time, but most of the time you’re seeing a typical American city in a highly urbanized setting.”

Schulte also said that agreement can be expected “99% out of 100% of the time” on major issues facing the council.

All this means less notoriety for the city. But the job of mayor is still expected to give Viterbi, who was once branded a “grinch” for trying to have Christmas dropped from the list of city holidays, a good deal of useful publicity for his expected reelection bid in November, 1988.

“I would expect that he’s going to be a very active mayor,” said Alan Katz, chief of staff for Lt. Gov. Leo T. McCarthy and a Santa Monica city councilman who has worked with Viterbi in Jewish organizations.

“He has the ability to reach out beyond the boundaries of West Hollywood to a variety of sources on the state and federal level,” Katz said. “To the extent that the city needs help from Congress, the Legislature and county government, he’s respected by important players at all three of those levels.”

The prospect of being mayor has forced Viterbi to drop at least one ball from his juggling act. In June he will resign as executive director of Women’s American ORT (Organization for Rehabilitation Through Training), a Jewish group that supports vocational schools around the world.

Busy Schedule

Viterbi said he is mulling over job offers from two other Jewish organizations but won’t accept new employment until the fall.

The ORT job, which paid between $30,000 and $40,000, kept him busy with frequent trips to Arizona, Nevada and around Southern California. City Council business took up at least 30 hours a week, Viterbi estimated.

At a recent council meeting, Viterbi had flown in hours earlier from Phoenix. He said he copes with the demands of work and politics by starting his day at 6 a.m. and using breakfasts, lunches and sometimes dinner for meetings.

“He’s extremely well organized in terms of life and life style and what he’s done for us in the last two years,” said Lucille Brotman of San Diego, chairwoman of ORT’s district executive committee.

“We’re really sorry to see him go,” she said. “He is compassionate but efficient, which I think is a nice combination.”

Once he becomes mayor, a job that requires the incumbent to chair meetings, sign checks and legislation and act as city spokesman, he expects to put in about 50 hours a week on municipal business.

“One shouldn’t abuse one’s privileges, but one does have a leadership role,” Viterbi said.

Viterbi held a recent breakfast interview over a plate of eggs and cottage cheese at Nibbler’s, a Beverly Hills coffee shop.

He said that in his spare time he hopes to complete work on his master’s thesis, a study of how to improve transportation for the elderly in West Hollywood.

Attended Claremont

He completed his course work in public policy analysis at Claremont Graduate School five years ago, but put off completing the thesis until the last minute.

“Our transportation people said they’re looking forward to seeing it,” Viterbi said.

People 65 and older make up 22.5% of West Hollywood’s population of about 37,000. Statewide, senior citizens make up 10.2% of the population.

Despite his youth, Viterbi is hardly a political neophyte. He founded a chapter of the American Jewish Congress while a student at UCLA and attributes his political ambition to the experiences of his parents in Europe before and during World War II.

His father, an Italian Jew, fled Italy in 1939, while his mother and her family dodged German troops in occupied Yugoslavia.

He was raised in a traditional Jewish home in San Diego and has made a point of arranging for kosher catering at the reception that will follow his swearing-in ceremony Monday night.

He also successfully fought a proposal to hold City Council meetings on Friday evenings, the beginning of the Jewish Sabbath.

“He’s a very impressive person, mature and knowledgeable in general, plus he has a wonderful Jewish background,” said Rabbi Gilbert Kollin of Hollywood Temple Beth El, where Viterbi was named to the board of trustees last year.

Described as Peacemaker

“This is unusual for someone so young, but he’s an unusual fellow,” Kollin said.

“Alan’s strongest quality is his ability to get along with very diverse elements,” Kollin said. “He’s emerged as a moderator, a peacemaker, respected by landlords, tenants, developers and conservationists alike.”

Viterbi was endorsed late in his first election campaign by the Coalition for Economic Survival, a tenants’ rights group, but he came in for praise from Grafton P. Tanquary, president of West Hollywood Concerned Citizens, an organization made up largely of property owners.

“Alan has always been willing to listen, and that’s very important,” Tanquary said. Recently, he said, Viterbi was persuaded by his arguments on a point about rent control and raised it during a City Council debate.

Larry Gross, head of the Coalition for Economic Survival, said his group supported Viterbi in the 1984 election along with three candidates who were leaders of the CES “because we wanted to make sure there would be someone we could work with and someone who was supportive of our directions and our positions.”

CES member

Although Viterbi is a member of the organization, Gross said CES activists and City Council members John Heilman, Helen Albert and Abbe Land have been voting “a lot more consistently along the line where we feel things should go.”

Despite that, he said, “we don’t have strong disagreements with him at this time.” He said it was too early to say if CES would endorse Viterbi for reelection.

Others in West Hollywood were less enthusiastic, although even Ruth Williams, a two-time council candidate who is contemplating another campaign next year, said she likes Viterbi.

She said she has received complaints that he lacks sensitivity to some local concerns, criticized some of his appointments to city commissions and said he is overly ambitious.

“I’m sure he wants to further himself beyond West Hollywood,” she said. “I wish him luck and hope something comes up very soon that he can move on to.”

Viterbi does not deny his ambition. “I’ll take it as a compliment,” he said. “It’s ambition that gets things done. I think that eventually I could be drawn to look elsewhere, but not now. I’m having too much fun in West Hollywood.”