Council’s Diplomat No Stranger to Big Deals : Ferraro: Quiet politicking has made him a popular and respected figure at City Hall. He often plays peacemaker at legislative meetings.

John Ferraro showed up as usual for his handball game Saturday morning with four longtime buddies who work up a sweat each week in the whitewashed courts of the Downtown Athletic Club.

Asked who won the morning’s contest, the 67-year-old president of the Los Angeles City Council smiled at his pals and proclaimed the session a tie.

Tact is to John Ferraro’s private life as diplomacy is to his public life. Last week he marshaled all of his personal and political skills to nudge an old and embattled friend, Police Chief Daryl F. Gates, toward retirement.

“I just don’t want to see the guy hurt,” Ferraro explained on Saturday. “He shouldn’t go out disgraced. What I’m trying to do is find that happy ground for him so he can do it gracefully.”

The agreement for Gates’ retirement, if it is carried out, could be the ultimate triumph for the affable Ferraro, who some at City Hall say is the only person who could pull off such a deal in the current superheated climate of city politics.

Ferraro’s ability to influence the volatile Gates is founded on a long history of quiet politicking that has made Ferraro a popular and respected figure at City Hall. He says he has no plans to run for mayor again, as he did unsuccessfully in 1985, and his colleagues say they believe him. But his deft handling of the Gates matter has solidified his position as a pre-eminent power at City Hall.

Born in Los Angeles to Italian immigrant parents, Ferraro is perhaps the quintessential Californian. Tall and athletic, he was an All-American lineman for USC and still wears the ring he was awarded when he was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.

After a successful career in insurance, Ferraro, who lives in Hancock Park, was appointed to the council in 1966 and has become a popular politician among voters in his district by taking care of their concerns and staking out a moderate course on a range of issues. He was reelected last April with 100% of the vote in a race in which he had no opponent. His district bends from Hancock Park to Silver Lake and up to part of Studio City.

One of his chief responsibilities as City Council president--a post to which his colleagues elected him--is management of the sometimes-fractious council meeting held three times a week. The part of him that deplores unpleasantness is ever on the lookout for potential confrontations. If he can, he will head them off on some procedural pretext. If he can’t, he may toss out a joke or clever observation to break the building tension.

Ever since the police beating of Rodney G. King on March 3, unpleasantness has permeated city government and given Los Angeles an international black eye. Until last week, when the release of the Christopher Commission Report suggested that Gates step down, Ferraro had been at a loss for a way to help end the turmoil.

“The thing that I’m concerned about is getting this situation settled,” Ferraro said in an interview Saturday. “We’re scaring tourists away. The fact is that all they hear and read is this negative stuff, the turmoil the city’s in, the division in the city. People, when they come for a vacation, they want to go somewhere pleasant.

“My only interest, really, is to do what’s best for the city.”

Despite his friendship and admiration for Gates, the commission report and the continuing uproar over the Police Department made it clear that Gates would have to go, Ferraro said. “They pointed to the door and showed him the way.”

If a solution were to be found, Ferraro reasoned last week, he was a likely person to find it. “I think I’m in a much better position to be able to do it than almost anyone,” he said. “Certainly (Mayor Tom) Bradley can’t do it and I’m probably in the best position on the council to do it because of my longtime relationship with Daryl Gates, my longtime support for the Los Angeles Police Department, which I’m proud of.”

“I’ve been there a long time,” Ferraro said of his 25 years on the council, “and everyone knows I’m fair. I’m very honest with my colleagues. If I agree with somebody or not agree with somebody, I treat them all the same. That’s why they elect me president.”

So, in a swirl of meetings and phone calls last Thursday, Ferraro and Councilman Joel Wachs, also an ally of the chief, came up with a proposal they hoped would allow Gates a “graceful exit.” Under its terms, the City Council would place a City Charter amendment on a special ballot by the end of the year and ask the voters to decide whether LAPD chiefs should be limited to two five-year terms. Gates already has served 13. For his part, according to Ferraro and Wachs, Gates would assist in the transition to a new chief and step down by the end of the year or shortly thereafter.

Ferraro praised the job Gates has done in shaping an efficient and well-trained force of 8,300 officers, but he acknowledged that the chief has had some failings, one of which is staying too long.

“Daryl is not perfect, obviously,” Ferraro said. “He’s made some mistakes. I don’t know why, when this first happened, that he didn’t get as much (information) as he could and point out that this was a bad deal and we’ve got to correct it. He’s kind of wishy-washy on it and that hurt him. . . .

“I don’t want to see Daryl embarrassed with an ignominious exit,” Ferraro added. “I want to see him go out with some pride and with his head high and be proud of what he’s done.”