Getting Through the Door : The Mayor Lends an Ear to Haves and Have-Nots

Siun Park was scrubbing office floors in 1973 when he first tried to see the new mayor of Los Angeles. A secretary politely informed Park that Tom Bradley had no time for a private visit with a janitor.

“I said, ‘No, I want to talk to mayor,’ ” recalled the 50-year-old Park, who said he called the mayor’s office at least three times, making the secretary “a little bit mad.”

But his persistence paid off. Within a month, the Korean immigrant who had lived in Los Angeles for only a year was inside Bradley’s office sharing, in broken English, his views on the city.

Since then, Park said, he has conferred with Bradley almost monthly, offering the mayor unsolicited advice on how to shelter the homeless, feed the poor, expand the Convention Center and build parks, libraries and senior centers in the city’s Korean community.

His frequent visits to the mayor’s office have continued despite a roller-coaster career--Park rose from custodian to start his own janitorial firm and became rich building apartment houses before he went broke investing in Olympic souvenirs. During better times, Park gave Bradley $25,000 in political contributions and was appointed by the mayor to serve on two city commissions.

Bradley said he values his association with Park because he is “a very politically active . . . leader in the Korean community.”

The mayor’s appreciation of Park is fitting: As an immigrant, an entrepreneur, a builder, a city commissioner and a political contributor, he represents the same mix of people who call on Bradley. This includes everyone from have-nots to business leaders, loyal supporters and city officials.

Dozens of people--most are prominent, some are not so well known--are able to take their problems and suggestions directly to Bradley, a Times study of the mayor’s appointment calendar found. One third of the mayor’s visitors are political supporters who have given more than $1 million to his campaigns since 1983, according to a computer analysis of meetings with 812 people listed on Bradley’s appointment schedule last year.

3 Types of Visitors

More than 100 interviews with people who met with the mayor last year show three categories of visitors: Those who are able to call him directly on the phone; those who go through an intermediary with close ties to the Bradley Administration, and those who keep pestering the mayor’s scheduling staff until they get an appointment.

The meetings listed in the mayor’s appointment calendar, obtained by The Times through the California Public Records Act, provide many examples of Bradley responding swiftly to a friend or supporter who needed a favor. In 1987, they included:

- William Robertson, a key Bradley ally and executive secretary of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor (AFL-CIO). Robertson solicited the mayor’s support for a proposal that would return to the city payroll 500 disgruntled school crossing guards who recently joined Teamsters Union Local 911.

The city has provided the crossing guards, who now earn $6.01 an hour, to public and private schools since the 1940s. Bradley, citing the cost benefits, approved a City Council vote in 1985 that paid a private security firm to operate the crossing guard service. Today, the guards are unhappy because their private employer has not provided the same pay raises, fringe benefits or job security that they once enjoyed as city workers, a Teamsters official said.

Change of Heart

Last year, Robertson assigned his assistant, Jim Wood, another Bradley confidant, to persuade the mayor to bring the guards back into the city fold. The mayor said he now favors putting the crossing guards on the city payroll--at an added cost of $2.6 million and against the joint recommendation of two city agencies. The mayor said he decided to switch after hearing arguments from all sides, although he said he could not recall who brought the matter to his attention.

However, a source in the mayor’s office said that Bradley became personally involved in the matter--he held three private meetings and numerous discussions--at the request of Robertson and Wood.

“When they say they want a meeting, they get one,” the source said. “They made it real clear that they wanted this.”

The City Council is expected to vote on the issue in coming weeks.

- Sooky Goldman, a community activist who in 1973 organized fund-raising events and put in long hours as a campaign volunteer for Bradley when he was first elected mayor. Recently, Goldman launched a crusade to ban all movie filming in Franklin Canyon, an attractive site for the industry because of its forest setting in the nearby Santa Monica Mountains. As the founding president of the William O. Douglas Outdoor Classroom, the feisty Goldman said she is against any filming in Franklin Canyon because the moving of heavy equipment interferes with the wilderness tours conducted by her nonprofit education center and endangers the lives of schoolchildren.

Goldman took her case to Bradley on March 9. “Sometimes when you need help, you want to call on a friend,” Goldman said. “I find my friends are very receptive. They listen and when they can’t do it, it’s OK. When they can, I’m very grateful.”

Compromise Reached

Bradley, who has aggressively courted film makers so they won’t take their business outside Los Angeles, asked city officials and the film industry last year to negotiate a compromise with Goldman. A tentative agreement was reached that restricted the frequency of filming while allowing both sides to share Franklin Canyon. Goldman, city officials and representatives from the filming industry continue to seek a permanent resolution.

Although some city officials applauded Bradley for not capitulating to Goldman’s demands, others suggested that the mayor would not have allowed anyone other than a strong-willed supporter such as Goldman to single-handedly limit filming schedules.

“Franklin Canyon is a problem that will continue,” said Maureen Kindel, who oversaw the film industry as Bradley’s former Public Works Board president. “The mayor is very, very close to his film committee. . . . Location filming is a very vital employment issue in the city. The William O. Douglas school also is close to him, particularly because Sooky Goldman made it important to him. She’s known him for years and she had no problem calling.”

- Robert Pandya, a second-year student at UCLA who was in the sixth grade when he first met Bradley at Norwood Street Elementary School. At the urging of his mother, Pandya wrote Bradley in advance of the mayor’s 1980 visit and led him on a tour of the Westside school. Since then, the two have exchanged letters periodically.

When Pandya applied to UCLA in 1986, he asked Bradley to put in a good word for him. Bradley said he called the chancellor’s office and strongly recommended Pandya as a sharp, enterprising student.

‘Powerful Recommendation’

“I needed a recommendation,” recalled Pandya, 19, who said he carried a 3.85 grade-point average at Granada Hills High School. “That is a pretty powerful recommendation. . . . I really appreciated that. . . . I think it really helped.”

Last fall, Pandya wanted to reside at a campus dormitory for a second year, but found there was no room because freshman students receive first priority. Pandya again asked Bradley for help. The mayor said he got Pandya his dorm room by placing another call to the chancellor’s office.

- Siun Park, the Korean immigrant and Bradley appointee on the city Convention and Exhibition Center Authority who confers regularly with the mayor. Park recommended several years ago that Bradley stop a $7.5-million city Housing Authority proposal to convert the old Hotel Commodore into a low-income housing complex for senior citizens. Park said he told Bradley the project was a boondoggle--$2 million in public housing funds had already been invested trying to renovate the hotel. Park also advised the mayor that he could build a new facility at half the cost.

Bradley had lobbied hard in 1981 for federal housing officials to approve the city’s plan to renovate the Commodore. But two years later the mayor and his Housing Authority commissioners suddenly lost interest in the proposal and decided to sell the hotel to a commercial developer. Park said he does not know how much he influenced Bradley’s decision, but said he continues to discuss with the mayor his hopes of building low-cost residential units for the elderly and homeless.

- Allen Alevy, a Los Angeles businessman who ran the state’s largest carnival operation, had a financial interest in a notorious Signal Hill massage parlor and owned a Las Vegas casino concession with a partner who was murdered. A Jewish community leader in Long Beach, Alevy was introduced to Bradley in 1984 by his sister. Since then, Alevy has contributed $5,100 to the mayor and the two have met on a regular basis.

Alevy said he recently complained to Bradley that winos were sleeping in an abandoned tavern and “terrorizing the neighborhood” near his Laundromat in South-Central Los Angeles. Within a couple of days, Alevy said, city workers posted a demolition notice on the bar and tore down the building a month later.

In another meeting, Alevy told the mayor about drug dealers who occupied an apartment complex next to his shopping center at the corner of Martin Luther King and Avalon boulevards.

“The last thing I need is hopped-up people in our shopping center. They were driving in our parking lot, people were doped out. . . . It was a catastrophe,” said Alevy, who claimed that he had reported the problems to police and city officials for two years before going to the mayor. “I don’t know what (Bradley) did but . . . all of a sudden everybody was evicted and the place was cleaned up and there is no drug dealing on that street now.”

‘I Was Impressed’

Alevy added: “I told the mayor what I saw. He said he would take care of it. I was impressed.”

Bradley maintains that he will go to bat for anyone--not just a friend or political supporter--who solicits his help.

“That is the way I see anybody who is approaching me,” Bradley said in an interview. “I think my reputation has been pretty well established that in all the years that I have been in public office nobody has come to me and asked for . . . something in the way of a favor that would not be appropriate.”

From tearing down dilapidated buildings to filling potholes, Bradley enjoys rolling up his sleeves at City Hall and making things happen. The mayor is at his best, according to his aides, when he is at his desk personally seeing to it that the nitty-gritty concerns of the city’s residents are taken care of.

‘Ultimate Problem Solver’

“The guy is probably the ultimate problem solver,” said Michael Gage, the mayor’s chief of staff. “He likes seeing a problem and trying to resolve it, particularly when it relates to the city and how it runs. . . . Dirty streets bother him. Things that are supposed to make this city a good place to live that aren’t working right bother him.”

Bradley conceded that the needs of longtime acquaintances and supporters get his immediate attention.

“Anybody who is a friend who has the ability to call me direct and ask for an appointment, if I know them that well, I am going to make a special effort to squeeze them in,” he said.

But the mayor was quick to add that he welcomes anyone who has a legitimate request to meet with him. “I see a lot of people who haven’t given me a dime. It doesn’t make any difference in that regard whether or not they get in to see me.”

Civics Lessons

On occasion Bradley will discuss a civics lessons at the request of an elementary student or attend a neighborhood block group meeting, his schedule shows. Recently, he sat down with an illiterate man who claimed in a rambling letter that he had solutions to his list of the city’s 10 most pressing problems, including police brutality and the homeless.

Many requests to see Bradley are handled by the mayor’s staff, Gage said. He added that Bradley frequently will meet with an average citizen who calls or writes in advance.

“If anybody tries, they can get in to see him,” Gage said. “What I would think gets a person in the door faster than anything else is an issue or . . . a problem that is intriguing.”

Some community and environmental groups, however, complained that it is difficult getting beyond the armed police guard and locked door outside the mayor’s office.

Refused Access

A coalition of 13 black ministers were refused access to Bradley on March 31 when they made an unannounced trip to City Hall to ask for the mayor’s help in their efforts to curb gang violence. The ministers made their surprise appearance to publicly criticize the mayor for refusing to meet with them in the past, said Rev. Charles Mims of the Tabernacle of Faith Baptist Church in Watts.

“We felt that was necessary to get his attention, to dramatize the urgency of all this killing here in South-Central Los Angeles,” Mims said. “We will continue to don our robes and to protest until we can come together (with Bradley) and somehow get a battle plan to stop this. . . . We feel we are totally left out.”

Bradley was not told that the ministers had asked to see him because he was tied up in meetings, said Fred McFarlane, the mayor’s spokesman. McFarlane said the ministers did not accept an invitation to confer with Bradley at a later date.

Invited to Visit

“I think they were much more interested in media exposure than they were in having an actual, substantive, sit-down meeting with the mayor,” McFarlane said.

A Westside environmental group, the Tree People, also had difficulty arranging a meeting with Bradley, said Andy Lipkis, the group’s executive director. After Tree People airlifted gifts of fruit trees to Cameroon, government officials there asked the organization to invite Bradley to visit their country during his African trip last year. It took two months of persistent phone calls and letters to get on the mayor’s schedule, Lipkis said. When a Tree People representative finally met with the mayor, Bradley agreed to include Cameroon on his African itinerary.

“There was quite a bit of staff resistance,” Lipkis said. “We felt if we weren’t screaming we really didn’t get heard.”

Loyal to Advisers

The people best positioned to get Bradley’s ear are the dedicated staff members who go back as much as two decades with the mayor. They include Anton Calleia, Philip DePoian, William Elkins and Grace Davis. Bradley is so loyal to these longtime advisers that he will side with them when major differences on policy matters arise among his staff, former Deputy Mayor Tom Houston said.

“People who have been there 15, 16, 18 years (have) personal relationships” with Bradley, said Houston, who directed the mayor’s staff for three years before resigning a year ago. “They are going to stop him in the hall. And the only thing that would bug me is they wouldn’t pitch (their argument) on the merits, they’d pitch it on it was personal to them. . . . They develop their own little turf and own little careers and the mayor in a sense is working for them. . . . He relates very personally to them.”

Remains Devoted

Bradley even remains devoted to longtime former aides who have politically embarrassed him. The mayor’s appointment calendar shows that Bradley met on a total of eight occasions last year with these former advisers: Warren A. Hollier, who was ordered by Bradley in 1980 to resign from the Public Works Board after it was revealed that he spent thousands of city dollars without documenting the expenditures; Maurice Weiner, who in 1976 quit as deputy mayor less than 24 hours after he was found guilty of lewd conduct in a Hollywood sex theater, and Elvin W. Moon, a former Building and Safety commissioner who urged engineering firms in 1986 to attend a $2,000-per-person fund raiser for Bradley by linking the event to a large city public works contract.

Bradley, who has come under fire from some black Democrats for his decision not to endorse the Rev. Jesse Jackson and remain neutral during the presidential primaries, met privately with each of the party’s leading candidates last year, except Jackson. The mayor’s calendar shows that Bradley, who is often mentioned as a possible vice presidential nominee, conferred in his office with Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis, Tennessee Sen. Albert Gore, Missouri Rep. Richard Gephardt and New York Gov. Mario Cuomo. He did not meet with Jackson until June 2--five days before the California primary.

Among the political supporters who appear often on Bradley’s calendar are: attorneys Richard Caruso, Johnnie L. Cochran Jr. and Melanie Lomax; Earl (Skip) Cooper, president of the Black Business Assn. of Los Angeles; Willie Davis, the former pro football star who runs a local beer distributorship; Bank of America Executive Vice President James Miscoll and Far East National Bank Chairman Henry Hwang; Chamber of Commerce President Ray Remy; longtime friend George Parks, who heads an association of black realtors; Los Angeles Unified School Board President Rita Walters; Central City Assn. President Christopher L. Stewart; Public Works Commissioner Dennis Nishikawa, and developers Danny Bakewell, Leonard Glickman, Alexander Haagen, Nathan Shapell, Ronald Lushing, James Miller and John King.

‘A Lot of Substance’

King has been acquiring downtown property for several years to build 2.5 million square feet of office space, retail shops and hotels. At King’s request last year, Bradley attended a luncheon at the New Otani Hotel to show King’s Japanese partners the city’s support for the massive development.

“I think the mayor’s presence anywhere lends a lot of substance,” King said. “Basically, what he did was assure them that the city bureaucracy is such that there would be a responsible focus on the issues and . . . some private interest group couldn’t torpedo the whole thing without due process.”

To get the mayor, King contacted his cousin, Barbara Trister, a longtime Bradley acquaintance and campaign volunteer who has her own public relations firm.

“Anyone has access” to Bradley, King said. “All you’ve got to do is call and want to see him . . . that is really part of what makes him a great mayor. He is there for everyone.”

So why did King use Trister to reach the mayor?

Key Intermediaries

“Maybe I felt she could get it done quicker,” King said. “I guess I was kind of reluctant to make the call. I just figured someone who is involved in doing him a lot of favors all the time . . . could get me a favor.”

Trister is among dozens of close friends and Bradley supporters who serve as facilitators for business executives and others who want to reach the mayor. These key intermediaries are able to relay an important message to Bradley immediately or meet with him on a moment’s notice.

“He trusts me,” said Trister, who has arranged other meetings between Bradley and her developer clients. “He knows I wouldn’t call him unless it would be something he’s interested in and significant.”

Another key Bradley facilitator is Harold G. Becks, a lawyer and an insurance industry lobbyist who relishes his role as a conduit to the mayor.

“Personally speaking, it is true a lot of people will come to me to gain an audience with the mayor,” Becks said. In some cases, Becks “will personally see to it that they get on the mayor’s calendar and they get on rapidly. I have been successful in doing that. I think the mayor has implicit trust in knowing I will not waste his time.”

Labor officials in Los Angeles who need to consult with the mayor know that the quickest route to Bradley’s office is through AFL-CIO Secretary Robertson.

“I do that for my peers in the labor movement,” Robertson said. “Many of them will think they have a crisis (and) they want to talk to the mayor about it. He is always receptive. That can be done often on very short notice. If his time is free, we do it right away. . . . If the mayor is in a position to help and generally he is, it’s a successful meeting.”

While these special connections help, they are by no means required to arrange a meeting with Bradley. For Tommy Keysor, a tow truck operator, it took one telephone call to see the mayor.

“It was a simple matter,” said Keysor, who was granted a meeting but not his request for a change in city transportation policy. “I don’t know him personally. He doesn’t know me. . . . I just called his appointment secretary and asked for a meeting to see the mayor. . . . Isn’t that what you are supposed to do with public politicians?”

And Bradley has continued to greet Siun Park on a regular basis, even though the Korean businessman went bankrupt in 1984 and stopped giving to the mayor’s political campaigns.

“I (have not made a) contribution in last couple of years, not even one cent,” said Park, who is starting over in the building industry. “He knows I don’t have even pennies, but always he listens. It’s the same way he treated me when I was in the money.

“If someone really is concerned about a better city, I think anybody can open the door to him.”

BRADLEY’S SUPPORTERS: CONTRIBUTIONS AND ACCESS Twelve of the top 20 contributors to Mayor Tom Bradley since 1983 appeared on the mayor’s appointment calendar last year. The 12 are denoted by bold type.

NAME COMPANY/TITLE BUSINESS Ron Lushing Ronald S. Lushing Real Estate Richard Riordan Riordan, Caps, Carbone & McKinzie Attorneys Ramon Bonin Dynamic Builders Real Estate James Miner San Jacinto Packing Co. Food Frederick W. Field Interscope Communications Financial Mary E. Waller Cosby and Waller Entertainment Financial Peter J. Sodini Boy’s Markets Food David Cunningham Political Action Committee Lobbyist Ira Distenfield Investment banker Financial Gilbert Lindsay City Councilman Political Fund Mark Weinberg Beverly Hills investment adviser Financial Robert Thomson Finley, Kumble, Wagner & Hein Attorneys Angel M. Echevarria Somma Co. Manufacturing Rob Maguire Maguire/Thomas Partners Real Estate Bob Finley Finley, Kumble, Wagner & Hein Attorneys Alexander Haagen Haagen Development Co. Real Estate Abe Spiegel Columbia Savings & Loan Assn. Financial Lod Cook Atlantic Richfield Corp. Oil Amarjit Marwah Amarjit S. Marwah, D.D.S. Medical Stanley Sheinbaun Investor Economist

1983-1987 NAME CONTRIBUTIONS Ron Lushing $183,220 Richard Riordan $131,000 Ramon Bonin $131,000 James Miner $102,500 Frederick W. Field $100,300 Mary E. Waller $93,500 Peter J. Sodini $89,500 David Cunningham $88,000 Ira Distenfield $86,161 Gilbert Lindsay $85,200 Mark Weinberg $84,239 Robert Thomson $62,157 Angel M. Echevarria $61,932 Rob Maguire $58,444 Bob Finley $54,350 Alexander Haagen $50,064 Abe Spiegel $48,380 Lod Cook $40,800 Amarjit Marwah $39,075 Stanley Sheinbaun $34,948

1987 ACCESS

Lushing 3 meetings in mayor’s office. Riordan 2 meetings in mayor’s office; hosted June 10 Bradley fund-raiser at 7th Street Bistro and Aug. 12 private dinner at Brentwood home; arranged for Bradley appearance at Dec. 30 charity benefit. Distenfield 3 meetings in mayor’s office, hosted Oct. 21 fund-raiser in Marina del Rey on yacht Lebon Vie, and Nov. 24 fund-raiser at Jimmy’s restaurant. Bonin Hosted Dec. 23 Christmas party at Dynamic Builders office, March 26 retirement dinner for city employee at Luminaras and June 3 open house at Bekins building. Thomson 2 meetings in mayor’s office. Cook 1 meeting, hosted April 7 business lunch at Arco. Cunningham 2 meetings in mayor’s office. Haagen 4 meetings in mayor’s office. Finley 1 meeting in mayor’s office. Marwah Hosted April 11 political fund-raiser at Malibu home attended by Bradley. Spiegel Feb. 27 breakfast at Hillcrest Country Club. Lindsay 1 meeting in mayor’s office. Source: City Clerk, Los Angeles Times Poll,

Mayor’s 1987 appointment calendar

Researcher: Cecilia Rasmussen

WHO GOT IN THE DOOR--BRADLEY’S ’87 MEETINGS One-third of the visitors to Mayor Bradley’s office last year have contributed to his political campaigns since 1983. Here’s a breakdown of the people who saw the mayor in 1987:

NUMBER PERCENT Business leaders 118 15 Foreign diplomats 110 14 City commissioners 90 11 Lobbyists, attorneys 71 9 City department heads 62 8 Developers, real estate 49 6 Community, charity, nonprofit groups 40 5 City Council members 32 4 Media interviews 31 4 County officials 29 4 Other 27 3 Unknown* 25 3 Investment, banking 25 3 Mid-level city officials 21 3 Education officials 19 2 Labor officials 17 2 Political consultants 13 1 Religious leaders 12 1 Public relations 11 1 Elected state officials 10 1 TOTAL 812 100

*The mayor’s office was unable to provide the identities of these visitors.

Source: Mayor’s 1987 appointment calendar

Times researchers Doug Conner and Cecilia Rasmussen contributed to this story.