City Funding for Campaigns Blocked : Ethics reform: Appeal court also questions the validity of other portions of L.A.’s Proposition H.

A state Court of Appeal has blocked Los Angeles from spending any funds under the campaign finance provisions of Proposition H, the sweeping ethics reform measure approved by voters in June, and questioned the “continuing validity” of other aspects of the landmark ballot measure.

In response to a lawsuit brought last week by state Sen. Quentin Kopp (I-San Francisco), Assembly Republican leader Ross Johnson (R-La Habra) and Los Angeles City Councilman Ernani Bernardi, the three-judge panel ordered the city to show why the controversial public financing provisions should not be rendered null and void.

The three politicians argued that Proposition H’s public financing provisions are illegal under the terms of Proposition 73, a 1988 state campaign reform measure.

Under Proposition H, public funds would be used to match money raised privately for city election campaigns at an estimated cost to taxpayers of more than $2 million a year. Proposition 73, which was authored by Kopp and Johnson, bans public financing at all levels of government.

The justices gave the city until Oct. 17 to defend the campaign finance provisions of Proposition H.

Assistant City Atty. Anthony Alperin said the order was standard. “It just gives the city an opportunity to tell its side.” City Councilman Michael Woo, who championed the ethics measure, said the court action does not present an immediate problem.

Still, in an unexpected move, the court asked the city to “address the question of whether public financing . . . is so integral to measure H as to require invalidation of the entire measure.”

Besides public campaign financing, Proposition H granted the mayor and City Council members a substantial raise, placed restraints on the outside income that elected officials can earn and restricted the activities of lobbyists.

The measure also created an ethics commission to oversee the new ethics and campaign financing laws. The court action does not prevent the commission from beginning to operate.

On Monday, city officials announced their appointments to the five-member commission.

Mayor Tom Bradley appointed USC law professor Dennis Curtis, who will chair the commission, and UCLA psychiatry professor Cynthia Ann Telles. Bradley described both as “independent and dynamic leaders.”

Curtis, 56, has taught at USC since 1981 and has been a visiting professor at the Harvard, Yale and the University of Chicago law schools, where he taught courses on professional responsibility.

Telles, 37, is the director of UCLA’s Spanish Speaking Psychosocial Clinic, which provides services for Spanish-speaking patients.

Controller Rick Tuttle chose Edwin O. Guthman, 70, former national editor of the Los Angeles Times. Guthman also worked for the Seattle Times, where in 1950 he won a Pulitzer Prize for articles about the Washington state Un-American Activities Committee.

City Atty. James K. Hahn appointed Alice Walker Duff, 43, an expert in child development and social policy.

City Council President John Ferraro appointed Treesa Way Drury, 53, director of advertising standards for the American Assn. of Retired Persons.

All the appointments must be approved by the City Council.