Katz Takes a Gamble in Mayor Derby

Figuring how to break out of the pack is a must for prospective candidates in Los Angeles’ 1993 mayoral race.

This, believe it or not, is probably Mayor Tom Bradley’s last term. He’s spent the last two years fighting charges of cronyism and conflict of interest and now even his friends want him to knock off after 20 years. Aware of that, a pack of hopefuls are poised to jump.

Unfortunately for them, that’s just what they are--a pack, with none of them able to distinguish themselves.

Most prominent are the City Hall regulars--council members Richard Alatorre, Gloria Molina, Michael Woo, Zev Yaroslavsky, City Atty. Jim Hahn. You see them working hard at the breakout game, grabbing hot issues, holding press conferences.

The game’s more difficult for the non-City Hall prospects who don’t have the Civic Center forum and the television coverage that goes with it. That’s had an impact on two Democratic assemblymen interested in running for mayor, the San Fernando Valley’s Richard Katz and Mike Roos of central Los Angeles. They’ve won political battles for the city in Sacramento. But the hometown electorate isn’t especially aware of them because local television rarely covers the Capitol, depriving Los Angeles legislators of a most powerful political communications medium.

That explains why Katz took an unusual gamble earlier this month.

He invested $50,000 of his campaign funds on television commercials starring none other than--Assemblyman Richard Katz. They showed him speaking for two of the transportation financing measures on next Tuesday’s ballot, Propositions 108 and 111. Katz is running for reelection to the Assembly. But the advertising, shown May 4-21, went areawide, far beyond his district.

Katz is one of the authors of the measures, and these days politicians don’t like to boast about proposing tax increases. That’s why there was an element of gambling in putting on the commercials. Proposition 108 authorizes a $1-billion bond issue for mass transit. Proposition 111 would double the state’s gas tax to 9 cents a gallon over the next five years, increase truck fees and raise the legal limit on state spending. When I asked him about the commercials’ impact on his political future, Katz said they “could cut either way.”

To reduce costs, Katz limited the commercials to Los Angeles cable television but he made sure they hit popular programming----ESPN sports, CNN news, Arts & Entertainment. His own favorite commercial is one that shows him on horseback, saying the traffic is so bad that soon it will be faster to ride a horse to work than drive. Even though the assemblyman was wearing a white shirt and tie, the commercial had the political image he’s been trying to sell--urban cowboy, down home enough to fit in with the horsey parts of the Valley, but able to win the toughest battles in Sacramento.

Pushing that image, Katz sometimes wears jeans and cowboy boots to work. But he still doesn’t look like much of a cowboy. With his slender frame, his neatly cut dark hair and his glasses, Katz is more the intense yuppie careerist. Some politicians--Ronald Reagan, Assembly Speaker Willie Brown--are born with the charm, trickiness and authority required by politics. Katz, with his edgy, stiff public style, acts like he’s still learning the moves.

Those imperfections didn’t keep Katz from Brown’s top team. He’s chairman of the Assembly Transportation Committee, and the House’s power on the issue. That allowed him to put enough pressure on the Southern California Rapid Transit District and the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission to help force a settlement of their senseless turf battle over construction and operation of rapid transit lines.

He’s using Sacramento experience and power to portray himself as a force in shaping events in Los Angeles. Given the way government runs today, the strategy makes sense.

State control over financing, highways, water policy, even local planning, means that state legislators have as much influence over the future of the Los Angeles basin as the county supervisors, city councils or the many independent commissions. In the past, legislative powers have not wanted to be involved with settling local problems. The state lawmakers always ended up being wounded in the cross-fire between feuding local government agencies.

Katz sees it differently.

His staff has told him that if Propositions 108 and 111 pass Tuesday, Los Angeles County would receive $4.5 billion of the estimated $18.5 billion in revenue generated by the proposals.

His television commercials are a first, small step in identifying himself with that potential bounty of new highways and rail lines--and in breaking out of the pack.