Farrell Vows to Reverse Recall Drive

Los Angeles City Councilman Robert Farrell, responding to a mounting political “crisis,” rallied some of his supporters Monday and vowed to turn back a recall campaign aimed at replacing him as the representative of South-Central’s 8th Council District.

Joined by more than 30 Baptist ministers at a news conference, Farrell portrayed the organizers of the recall movement as political manipulators and “sore losers” unhappy over their failure to defeat him during last April’s city elections.

Acknowledging that his opponents “have provoked a crisis in my political life,” Farrell sought Monday to reverse the momentum and said that his own supporters have begun fanning out in local neighborhoods to dissuade residents from signing recall petitions. He was also buoyed by promises of the clergymen at his side to take the councilman’s case to the pulpit.

“What you see is the beginning of a response to a challenge, the like of which those provoked have never expected and have never seen,” Farrell said.

Mervin Evans, a business development consultant who ran unsuccessfully against Farrell, filed the papers needed to launch the recall campaign. And Kerman Maddox, a former aide to Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley, has said he may challenge Farrell if an election is held.

Characterizes Opponents

But Farrell, without using their names, blamed the recall attempt on “one disgruntled person who tried in the spring election and didn’t make it” and on someone “who ostensibly used to work for the mayor and he was a failure there, and he was fired there.”

“Now he comes into this community attempting to stimulate recall,” Farrell said.

An aide to Bradley denied that Maddox had been fired from his job as a special liaison to the black community. And Maddox strongly disputed Farrell’s contentions.

“I think it’s the height of irresponsibility and an embarrassment to the people in the 8th District that someone would be so fast and loose with the facts,” said Maddox, who resigned from the mayor’s office last July to start his own business.

Farrell said Monday that he is confident that he will obtain the mayor’s support in fighting the recall as well as the backing of other council members.

Bradley was not available for comment. But if the recall effort succeeds and an election is held, the mayor could be faced with a dilemma of whether to support a politically vulnerable incumbent who has been a longtime ally or a former deputy running for the first time.

Clear on Own Choice

Some of the Baptist ministers who showed up Monday made it clear which candidate Bradley and other city leaders should support.

“We are working with (Farrell), and we recognize that he is doing a splendid job at this time,” said the Rev. Frank Higgins, president of the Baptist Ministers Conference of Los Angeles and Southern California.

Another pastor, the Rev. T. L. Willis, claimed that needy people had been required to sign recall petitions before being given cheese and butter. He refused to disclose any details or identify those making such demands, but he said authorities have been notified.

Maddox, however, said the allegation was untrue because, under the city process, actual recall petitions cannot be circulated until later this month. “Those charges are absolutely false,” Maddox said.

Evans could not be reached for comment. His recall committee has about four months to gather the 12,550 signatures he needs to force Farrell into a special election.

Farrell, who has represented the district since 1974, survived a similar recall effort in 1978. The South-Central neighborhoods of the 8th Council District include some of the poorest residents of the city. Although still predominantly black, the district has become more Latino and Asian.