CITY COUNCIL ELECTIONS / 12TH DISTRICT : Candidates Clash on Creating Taxes to Balance Budget : Hal Bernson: The incumbent opposes any new levies on L.A. residents. But critics say he offers no alternatives for cutting the deficit.

Los Angeles City Councilman Hal Bernson prides himself on being a tax fighter, a reputation he expects will pay off in ballot-box dividends as he seeks reelection in the politically conservative northwest San Fernando Valley.

But Julie Korenstein, the 12th District lawmaker’s challenger in Tuesday’s runoff election, and some of his own council colleagues have said Bernson’s stubborn no-tax stance during the recent City Hall budget debate smacked of irresponsibility.

In that debate, Bernson flatly refused to consider approving new taxes to deal with the city’s remaining $52.7-million budget deficit, at least if they were going to be levied on city residents. As for non-residents? That might be another story, said Bernson, who has complained that commuters working inside but living outside the city don’t pay enough for the city services they get.

Bernson was especially adamant in opposing a new real estate transfer tax, a levy that will be imposed on residents upon the sale of their property. He joined with a vocal coalition of real estate brokers, builders and a scattering of homeowner groups to fight the plan, which won final approval of the City Council on Friday. Under terms of the measure, homeowners would pay $2.55 per $500 of assessed valuation.

But what irks Bernson’s colleagues is that he offered no alternative to either a tax increase or a cut in police manpower. The same resentment has been voiced in the past against Councilman Ernani Bernardi, the council’s most cantankerous tax basher.

The logic of the council’s majority was that, unless the budget deficit is closed with new taxes, it would have to be resolved by cutting the city’s police force through attrition by about 300 officers. “You can’t have it both ways,” Councilman Richard Alatorre chided Bernson, who is a well-known Police Department supporter, during the debate.

One of Bernson’s rejoinders to critics of his budget votes has been that the seemingly cruel fiscal dilemma posed by the council majority was actually illusory. An equally valid, third solution would be to cut $52.7 million from the city’s spending plan--but not from the police budget, Bernson contended.

What services would he have reduced? Not police, fire or paramedics, Bernson said. After that, no cuts should be made in an across-the-board way. “We should start cutting the lowest priority items first,” he said.

Still, Bernson has never identified any low-priority items he believed should get the ax first, a position that has drawn some flak. “It’s easy to say we shouldn’t impose this tax or that tax,” said Council President John Ferraro. “Sure, cut the library. I don’t use the library. But what about our young people who do?”

Bernson’s budget performance was “a game of political cowardice,” Korenstein said recently. Her objection: If Bernson were to act responsibly, he would have a plan of his own to solve the budget crunch. “You can’t just vote no,” she said. “You need to offer a solution to the deficit.”

Bernson is no newcomer to tax bashing.

In the late 1970s, he was a leader of the Howard Jarvis-led Valley forces seeking passage of Proposition 13, the legendary property tax-slashing measure.

And in 1985, he signed a ballot argument to oppose the levying of a special property tax to fund the hiring of 1,000 additional police officers. The city could afford to hire more officers if only it tightened its belt in other areas, Bernson argued then.

More recently, Bernson’s “long history of fighting the bureaucrats and big-spenders” was cited in an endorsement of the incumbent mailed to 12th District residents over the signature of Joel Fox, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn.

Bernson also has contended that he has tried to make the city Planning Department, which reports to him as chairman of the council’s Planning and Land Use Management Committee, more cost-conscious.

For example, Bernson co-authored a 1990 plan that calls for developers to pay the actual costs the city incurs in processing their various land-use applications, for such purposes as zone changes and variances. A November, 1990, city budget office report claimed an extra $4.4 million in processing fees could--and should--be levied against developers.

Although the fees have not yet been approved, the city’s recently adopted budget counts on their enactment and collection in the upcoming fiscal year.

“Hal has actually been one of those with a vision of making the Planning Department 100% fee-supported,” said Steve Wong, assistant chief of the city’s budget office.