ELECTIONS / L.A. CITY COUNCIL : Galanter’s 6 Challengers Jockey for Way to Emerge From Pack

In the opening weeks of the campaign for Ruth Galanter’s seat on the Los Angeles City Council, her six challengers on the ballot have spoken as one in attacking the incumbent.

But to position themselves as serious contenders in the 6th District’s April 9 primary, the six increasingly will need to establish their own qualifications and positions. In seeking their political niches, they have taken a variety of routes:

Mary Lee Gray stresses her long service as an aide to three county supervisors. Tavis Smiley emphasizes his work for Mayor Tom Bradley and former City Councilwoman Pat Russell. J. Wilson Bowman talks about education. Mervin Evans touts his campaign experience. Salvatore (Sal) Grammatico recounts his battles as a community activist. And Charles Mattison talks about the value of religion.

Gray and Smiley have emerged as the most active and best financed of Galanter’s foes. Gray has raised $45,354 and Smiley $34,861, according to campaign reports filed last week.

But both already have spent most of their money--Gray has $13,418 left and Smiley $1,955--putting them far behind Galanter, who has $92,787 in the bank.

Here is a look at each of Galanter’s foes:

Mary Lee Gray, 50, likes to point out that she has more years of government service than Galanter in most of the 6th District. As deputy to three successive Los Angeles County supervisors, most recently Deane Dana, Gray has directed constituent services in most of the Westside for 18 years.

“I’m the most experienced person running for the seat,” she said.

But Galanter supporters want voters to focus on other parts of Gray’s resume--her Republican Party registration in the heavily Democratic district and her alliance with Dana, who is known for his pro-development positions.

Gray said she is comfortable with both parties, having been registered as a Republican most of her life but as a Democrat from 1973 to 1981.

Galanter’s backers hope the Dana link will cause severe political problems for Gray in an area that generally spurns development.

“She has the serious baggage of her current boss, a pro-development supervisor,” said Galanter campaign consultant Steven Glazer. “And she has done nothing herself to control growth.”

But Gray has refused to forsake Dana. She noted that he won in Venice and Westchester during his last campaign and said she may ask Dana to assist with fund raising “if I run into difficulty.”

Dana has endorsed his senior deputy, but said he does not intend to raise money for her campaign.

Gray pledges to be an independent councilwoman, saying she differs from her boss on several issues. For instance, she said she opposes increased density in the proposed redevelopment of Marina del Rey and supports Los Angeles’ rent-control law.

She has pledged to be tough on development, saying community plans should be enforced without any negotiated exemptions. She promised that on the district’s major building proposal--the planned construction of a mini-city called Playa Vista between Marina del Rey and the Westchester bluffs--she would demand that the developers reduce the project’s density by 30%. The current proposal includes 11,750 apartments and condominiums, and 5 million square feet of office space.

Gray said there are some instances, however, when development is desirable.

Galanter, for example, asked the city to reduce the size of a golf course planned for land west of Los Angeles International Airport, saying sand dunes should be preserved as a habitat for the endangered El Segundo blue butterfly.

But Gray calls the area blighted and says the original plan for a 200-acre golf course should be adopted “to bring more money into the city’s coffers.”

Tavis Smiley is the campaign’s brash young man.

Although just 26, he likes to say that history is on his side, noting that Zev Yaroslavsky was the same age when he was elected to the City Council in 1975.

Smiley left his job as an aide to Mayor Tom Bradley in September to begin campaigning full time. He espouses a liberal political agenda, and he recently gained the endorsement of the New Frontier Democratic Club, one of the city’s oldest black political institutions.

Smiley was 20 and a student at Indiana University when he began a letter and telephone campaign that landed him a summer internship in Bradley’s office. The internship sowed the seeds for future jobs with Russell, one of the mayor’s strongest allies, and for Bradley.

It is the background that Smiley touts most, especially his work for Russell, that the Galanter camp already is using against him.

Russell lost to Galanter in 1987 largely because of the perception that she had permitted too much development in the district. Glazer, Galanter’s campaign consultant, said Smiley “served Pat Russell and has to take some responsibility for not speaking up against her development policies.”

Although he said he still admires Russell, Smiley said it is unfair to hold him accountable for her policies. He noted that he was only a junior field deputy and worked in the Crenshaw office for just a few months before Russell’s defeat.

Ozie Hunt, Russell’s chief deputy in Crenshaw, said Smiley was “very good at working on constituent complaints.”

Other former co-workers don’t remember it quite that way.

They said Smiley was at his best speaking to residents or writing letters, but that he seemed disinterested in correcting constituent problems. “He had lousy follow-through and a way of getting other people to do his work,” said one, who requested anonymity. Hunt said he heard nothing of the complaints. Smiley said his hiring as a Bradley aide was an affirmation of his good work.

Smiley launched his first campaign attack in January with a mailer to 14,000 homes in the Crenshaw-Baldwin Hills area. The mailer charged that Galanter has failed to lure large retailers to the area.

He has pledged to keep development to a minimum in coastal communities. He said he is committed to keeping the Playa Vista development “as low-density as it can be.”

But like Galanter, Smiley said he must see a pending environmental impact report on the project before determining how much it could be reduced.

Smiley said that as a council member he would concentrate on expanding the local environmental movement. “The city is spending big money on recycling,” he said, citing one example. “But that needs to be expanded to other parts of the city, like South-Central L.A.”

J. Wilson Bowman doesn’t go by a first name. Just J. Some friends like to call her “Dr. J” since she has a doctorate in educational administration.

The nickname emphasizes Bowman’s interest in education.

The Compton College administrator, who directs job training and other special programs, says that as a council member she would save money and solve problems by enlisting college students, instead of highly paid consultants, to tackle some issues. Special projects by USC and UCLA students would bring in innovative ideas on difficult topics, such as promoting economic development in the Crenshaw District, Bowman suggested.

The coal miner’s daughter who graduated from Tuskegee University in Alabama and received her doctorate from UC Berkeley, said she would concentrate on basic constituent services. “Streets need to be repaired,” she said. “Trees need to be cut.”

She pledged to keep development at a minimum in Westside communities that have complained of too much growth and to attract new businesses to serve such communities as Baldwin Hills. “So far as the black community, this is one of the richest areas in the United States,” Bowman said. “We just have to show businesses that.”

Mervin Evans, 38, is the most experienced campaigner in the race. He has run twice for Congress, taken a couple of shots at other City Council seats, led a 1987 effort to recall City Councilman Robert Farrell and last year bid for the Democratic Party nomination for secretary of state.

His effort in the 6th District is his seventh campaign in just five years. “I’ve got the candidate fever, and I haven’t gotten over it yet,” Evans said. “But I’ve got to win this time. I’m sick of running.”

Evans, a business consultant, said he moved to Playa del Rey to run in the 6th District because he did not want to run again in the 8th or 9th districts, where he lost previously.

He said he is not discouraged by his failures, believing they have made his name better known. He also likes to note that City Councilman Nate Holden, who won his seat in 1987, had lost six of seven previous elections for a variety of posts.

On development, Evans said that too much housing has been built in the district and that he would put a moratorium on new residential construction.

On crime, he said the National Guard should be brought in to police neighborhoods where drugs and gangs are out of control.

Salvatore (Sal) Grammatico is making his second run for the 6th District council seat, after a 1987 primary campaign in which he finished last in a field of six with 2% of the vote. Galanter was second that time and went on to defeat Councilwoman Russell in a runoff.

Grammatico, 38, said he expects to do better this time because of his many activities in the district. He heads the homeowners association in Del Rey, a neighborhood southwest of Culver City, and is president of the Coalition of Concerned Communities, an alliance of 14 homeowners groups.

Last year, he filed a lawsuit that charged a developer with completing an insufficient environmental review for a project to build 86 UCLA faculty homes on the Westchester bluffs. The case is on appeal, after being thrown out by a Superior Court judge who ruled it was filed late.

A native of Tunisia who was raised in Naples, Italy, Grammatico said community advisory boards that screen development projects, a Galanter innovation, are a good idea. But he said the boards would represent the communities better if they were elected at town hall meetings, instead of being appointed by the council person.

Grammatico pledged to limit development between Marina del Rey and the Westchester bluffs to as little as 200 acres, instead of the 670 acres that make up the Playa Vista development.

Charles A. Mattison, 51, of Baldwin Hills, said that as a councilman he would try to satisfy his constituents by providing a maximum of basic services, such as tree trimming and filling potholes, and compromising on contentious issues like development.

Mattison said it is too early to make specific pledges on development. But he said government needs to make building limits clearer to developers.

He described his own experience in trying to build a four-home development on property in Malibu. The state Coastal Commission asked for changes in the project, which Mattison said he made, only to have the building turned down for different reasons.

“You have to make the message clear as to what is wanted,” Mattison said.

Mattison recently returned to a dental practice in Compton after several years as a full-time minister in the United Church of Christ. He said churches and other community organizations have to initiate more programs to help reduce crime and drug abuse. But the city also needs to spend more money on social programs and education, instead of law enforcement, he said.

“To wage war on crime and drugs, we have to change the minds of the people,” he said. “More police and jails have not done it.”

CHALLENGERS IN 6TH DISTRICT RACE Salvatore Grammatico Age: 38 Home: Del Rey Occupation: Realtor Quote: “I’m going to enforce the (zoning) laws that are on the books (and). . .do everything in my power to make sure community plans are enforced.”

J. Wilson Bowman Age: (declined to state age) Home: Baldwin Vista Occupation: College Administrator Quote: “So far as the black community, this is one of the richest areas in the United States. We just have to show businesses that.”

Tavis Smiley Age: 26 Home: Leimert Park Occupation: Mayoral aide Quote: The environmental movement has been a Westside-led movement. That has to be expanded to other parts of the city.”

Mary Lee Gray Age: 50 Home: Mar Vista Occupation: Senior deputy, County Board of Supervisors Quote: “(The Playa Vista development) should be at least 30% less density. . . .It would probably be even more of a cut because a lot of questions have not been answered.”

Charles A. Mattison Age: 51 Home: Baldwin Hills Occupation: Dentist, minister Quote: “To wage war on crime and drugs, we have to change the minds of the people. More police and jails have not done it.”

Mervin Evans Age: 38 Home: Playa del Rey Occupation: Business consultant Quote: “I’ve got the candidate fever and I haven’t gotten over it yet.”