Bradley Faces Fund-Raising Inquiry : Politics: Authorities will investigate misconduct charges. A mayor’s spokesman denies any wrongdoing.

The Los Angeles Police Department and other state and local agencies will investigate fund-raising activities of Mayor Tom Bradley’s appointees and aides, including possible misuse of city resources for campaign purposes, a police spokesman said Tuesday.

“We will be conducting an investigation . . . in a cooperative effort with the district attorney’s office and the (state Fair Political Practices Commission,)” said Cmdr. William Booth.

Officials with the district attorney’s office earlier had offered to cooperate in such an investigation and provide a prosecutor from a unit that probes political corruption cases.

The FPPC has said it is reviewing the fund-raising activities.

Booth said the three-agency investigation will involve activities reported in recent Times articles. He said some of the activities “could constitute criminal conduct.”

Bradley could not be reached late Tuesday, his office said. But Bradley press secretary Bill Chandler said: “The mayor has always insisted his staff and commissioners obey both the letter and spirit of the law.”

The Times reported last week that Bradley aides and appointees raised more than $700,000 over the past five years. Several city commissioners held fund-raisers in their homes that yielded thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from lobbyists, developers, city contractors and others doing business with their agencies.

Also, records and interviews indicated that Bradley City Hall aides operated a political fund-raising network in City Hall that used city telephones, secretaries, equipment and possibly staff time.

State law prohibits use of city resources, including offices and equipment, for campaign purposes. Prosecutions have been rare, but violations can be felonies.

Another state law bans commissioners from raising funds from those with matters pending before their agencies and violations can lead to fines.

Commissioners have denied violating the law or said any violations were unintentional. Bradley aides have said their actions were proper or declined to comment.

Generally defending his fund-raising activities, Bradley earlier Tuesday said that in 17 years in office he has never “asked a commissioner to conduct any kind of fund raising on my behalf or for me.”

Bradley’s remark was part of his first public response to The Times’ disclosures.

However, the mayor’s comment appeared to be at odds with his actions of last year.

In August, 1989, Bradley summoned several prominent city commissioners and other supporters to his city-owned Hancock Park residence to seek help in raising $300,000 for legal bills in connection with investigations of his personal finances and official actions.

Several of those who attended the well-publicized gathering, including Bradley’s appointees to city commissions, said at the time that the mayor asked them to collect contributions for a legal defense fund.

“I need you to see if you can get some friends to raise some money,” City Zoning Commissioner Nikolas Patsaouras quoted Bradley as saying at the time.

The legal defense committee has since raise several hundred thousand dollars.

Public records show that several of the commissioners Bradley asked for help later conveyed contributions to the committee. They included Airport Commissioner Johnnie L. Cochran Jr.; Recreation and Parks Commissioner Bill Robertson; City Housing Commissioner Dori Pye; former Building Advisory Appeals Board President Patric Mayers, and Convention Center Commissioner Madelyn Murray.

Bradley, who has declined to be interviewed on the fund-raising activities, made only brief comments Tuesday before leaving a City Hall news conference on an unrelated matter.

Asked afterward about the apparent conflict between Bradley’s statement and his actions of last year, Bradley’s press secretary, Bill Chandler, declined to comment directly. But he said “the 1989 meeting was no exception” to the mayor’s insistence that staff and commissioners follow the law, Chandler said.

Bradley also said Tuesday that fund raising and his city appointments are unrelated. “Never have I appointed or removed anyone from a commission based upon any contribution which they may have made, or any solicitation which they may or may not have made,” he said.

Some of Bradley’s appointees had complained that conflict-of-interest laws are confusing and the city attorney, the mayor’s office and the mayor’s campaign aides never adequately alerted them to potential problems.

Bradley said Tuesday that his practice for many years has been to have new commissioners briefed on the law by the city attorney.