Chief Not Legally Bound by His Promise to Step Down in 1992

No one can hold Los Angeles Police Chief Daryl F. Gates to his promise that he will retire next April, the city attorney’s office said Monday.

“It’s nothing but a gesture without legal implications,” said Assistant City Atty. Siegfried Hillmer, who advises the city Board of Pension Commissioners. “Just to say I want to retire sometime in 1992 is like to say I want to go fishing in 1992.”

Gates made the promise Monday in a letter to City Council President John Ferraro and in a videotaped message to police. He said he would stay past April if a replacement has not yet been named.

The retirement will not become final until Gates makes a formal application to the Board of Pension Commissioners and the board approves it. In the meantime, Gates could change his mind, officials said.

Police and firefighters who apply for pensions change their minds “with some regularity,” said Assistant City Atty. Diane Wentworth, who advises the city’s Personnel Department.

At least one of the city’s general managers--which is Gates’ rank as a department head under the City Charter--has done the same thing.

But neither Wentworth nor Phil Henning, the city’s assistant personnel director, would identify the general manager who “announced and then unannounced” his intention to retire. They said they did not know whether the information is public.

Henning said his department has begun a process that will take at least six months to find a successor for Gates.

He said the department is “at the earliest stages” of developing a slick brochure describing the chief’s job for candidates around the country.

Candidates for the job, which pays from $124,988 to $187,482 a year, will be asked to answer a series of four or five questions by mail--sending in typewritten answers no more than a page or two long.

A review committee--usually five people appointed by the Civil Service Commission--will study the responses and winnow the list of candidates to 12 or 15.

Under the current City Charter, the Civil Service Commission will then appoint a separate board of community leaders to conduct face-to-face interviews with candidates.

This interview board will rank the top six.

The Police Commission, which is appointed by the mayor and generally shows political loyalty, would be free to name any of the six as the new chief.

If new City Charter provisions recommended by the Christopher Commission are in place, the Police Commission will do its own interviews and come up with its own list of six.

The commission would then submit its top three choices to the mayor, who, if not satisfied, could ask for the next three on the commission’s list.

The mayor will appoint the chief, subject to confirmation by the City Council.