BRADLEY INTERVIEW WITH CITY AUDITORS

Following are excerpts from an interview of Mayor Tom Bradley conducted by City Controller Rick Tuttle and his aides as part of their audit of an African trade task force headed by Juanita St. John. In the Aug. 18, 1989, interview, the mayor was asked whether he directed an aide to contact the controller about three matters.

Question: Mr. Mayor, did you authorize Anton Calleia of your staff to talk to Mr. Tuttle about the audit that we were performing of the task force?

Answer: Yes.

Q: What was the purpose in authorizing him?

A: There were two items that had been covered in questions or an incident that caused me some concern. The first of these dealt with an employee who had worked for the task force, and there was a letter dealing with that employee’s employment or the termination of that employment, and I indicated to Anton that I felt that the letter, which I was told had been demanded by you from Mrs. St. John, would violate the Privacy Act if it were released, and inasmuch as it was part of the public document in your office, I had some concern about it. That employee happened to be my daughter.

My concern also related to what I saw was a serious problem of liability for the city if that letter, in fact, had been released.

Q: Mr. Mayor, did you also authorize Anton Calleia to contact me regarding the allowance of certain expenditures regarding Mrs. St. John’s husband’s hotel expenses?

A: Yes. I asked that that question be raised with you as well because it appeared to be in direct contradiction to the normal practice followed in the city , where city employees and elected officials going on conference and conventions taking their spouses would simply charge the hotel to the city , even if their spouses stayed with them, and I thought that this was a sudden departure from that . And if it were, I could see that many thousands of city employees were going to be operating under some new guidelines or a new interpretation that they had not heard before.

Q: Did you also authorize Anton Calleia to contact me regarding IRS information that the controller requested of St. John?

A: No. I don’t recall a conversation about IRS.

Q: Mayor Bradley, have you ever requested anyone on your staff to speak to me about any other audits that were in progress, to the best of your recollection?

A: Not as far as I recall. Mr. Tuttle, I want to make it very clear to you and on this record, never have I attempted to thwart an audit nor was that the intention in that case.

Source: city controller’s office transcript