Newsletter Cartoons of Asians, Latinos Embarrass RTD

Cartoons mocking Latino and Asian bus riders have appeared in recent editions of an RTD-produced, in-house newsletter, prompting complaints from at least one Latino driver and embarrassing management officials as they try to attract more minority riders.

One of the comics, which appeared in a newsletter for employees at a downtown division, shows a skeleton-like, serape-and-sombrero-garbed rider wasting away at a stop as he waits for a bus to arrive on an East Los Angeles route. “Is about time for Serrano to show up,” the rider says, as a Latino driver who regularly works the route drives up.

Another of the “Operator’s Humor” cartoons depicts a rotund sumo wrestler, in topknot hairdo and loincloth, trying to board a bus bound for Little Tokyo. The driver refuses him saying, “You won’t fit my door.”

The newsletter is printed by the RTD under the direction of the division manager, Chris Coleman, and is “designed for the enjoyment of the division people alone,” RTD spokesman Greg Davy said. There are about 350 employees, including bus drivers, mechanics, clerks and managers, in the division.

Raul Serrano, a veteran driver, said he took the cartoon referring to him as a personal slur and an insult to the Latino passengers he carries. “They should never depict those people like that,” said Serrano, who grew up in East Los Angeles and volunteers for routes there. “Those are hard-working people. . . . It’s not even funny.”

RTD board member Carmen Estrada, who has been helping promote a free bus ride campaign aimed at building bus ridership among minorities, called the cartoons “disturbing and racist” and said she will demand an explanation from acting General Manager Alan Pegg.

“I think it is inexcusable (that the district) would have anything to do with it,” she said. The cartoons are offensive “not only to our Asian and Hispanic employees,” she said, “but to our ridership,” which is predominantly low-income Latino.

“Fortunately, it was an in-house cartoon,” she said, adding that she will seek a retraction by the district and disciplinary action against employees where appropriate.

Coleman, the division manager who oversees the newsletter, referred questions to his boss, Transportation Director Leilia Bailey.

Bailey, who is sent copies of the newsletters, said she had not seen the cartoons until after a reporter began to make inquiries. “It is awful . . . insensitive,” she said of the drawings.

The cartoons may be seen as reinforcing negative images of minorities among bus drivers, Bailey said, but she added that she plans to take no disciplinary action. “I think there was no intent to disparage or be derogatory,” she said.

While the racially oriented cartoons slipped through management’s review, district officials were on their toes when it came to another politically sensitive matter.

Bailey said she ordered the newsletter that carried the Serrano/Latino cartoon to be redone at the last minute to exclude an “inflammatory” item.

It was a request by a bus driver that his colleagues help him force an election that could change the union that represents bus operators. “I thought there was no place for that in the division newsletter,” she said.

Bailey said she did not notice the offensive cartoon at the time.