$1,000 on Port Expense Tab Rejected : Spending: City controller calls meals--at up to $78 a person--too costly and denies appeal of limits.

Los Angeles City Controller Rick Tuttle, trying to tighten up on “excessive” entertainment spending by Harbor Department officials, has rejected nearly $1,000 worth of high-priced dinner tabs and quashed an effort by port officials to be exempted from city spending standards.

Among the rejected tabs was a $310 bill--about $78 per person--from the swank Checkers Hotel downtown, where Commissioner Jun Mori and another port official entertained two Japanese shipping executives. City auditors said Wednesday that they had retrieved a copy of the order from the restaurant and found that it included $32 lobster plates, $27 lamb entrees, a $31 bottle of wine and escargot appetizers.

Other challenged expenses included a $371 dinner--$74 per person--at Bernard’s in the downtown Biltmore Hotel, where Mori and port executive Tay Yoshitani were host to Japanese banking representatives. Two other bills for more than $60 per person at West Hollywood’s Madeo Ristorante also were rejected.

Ray Green, a chief auditor who reviews port expense statements, said: “They go first class. I can see visitors ordering the most expensive thing on the menu, but why do the harbor people have to?”

Additionally, after questions were raised by The Times, Tuttle said he is reviewing a bill of nearly $850 for a gathering of about 30 port employees, agents and shipping company representatives a few months ago at Medieval Times--a huge Orange County dinner theater where patrons cheer as knights joust on horseback. The $26-per-person cost was within city guidelines, but “if it is straight entertainment, it would be a no-no,” Tuttle said.

Port spokeswoman Julia Nagano said: “We do believe they are valid expenses. But in light of (Tuttle’s action) we will be reviewing the expenses. We are sensitive to the controller’s concerns.”

Earlier, Nagano told The Times that the Medieval Times party was part of an annual, weeklong port event where trade representatives from around the world are brought together to coordinate strategy.

In a summit meeting with Tuttle last month, the controller said harbor Executive Director Ezunial Burts argued that the fast-growing port is a unique city enterprise and should be permitted to spend more on entertainment than other city departments.

“I do not agree that of all the elected, appointed and other city employees . . . the Harbor Department has a special need to routinely spend double the highest allowable amount for meals within the city of Los Angeles,” Tuttle later wrote Burts in rejecting the request.

Research by his staff, Tuttle said, shows that business dinners in the Los Angeles area can be obtained for $30 to $40 per person--a standard he applies to all city departments when authorizing reimbursements.

Increases in the port’s outlays for promotion, travel and entertainment have been a target of criticism by City Council members and city auditors. The Times reported in October that travel and entertainment costs for harbor commissioners and their staff had nearly doubled in six years to a total of more than $600,000.

Last week, The Times reported that Los Angeles port officials were spending nearly 10 times as much their chief competitor--the Port of Long Beach--for a full-time trade promoter in Japan, including his $127,000 annual salary and nearly $100,000 each year for entertainment and private club memberships. The Port Commission earlier this year boosted the agent’s contract to more than $450,000, despite repeated objections from auditors at both the controller’s office and the port.

Port officials maintain that the expenditures are crucial in keeping Los Angeles Harbor, now the nation’s busiest cargo handler, competitive. The port handles $45 billion worth of cargo annually and turned an $81-million profit last year, officials say.

Port officials also say that the money being spent on dinners, travel and promotion comes from leases and fees charged to shipping firms, not from general city taxes. Those funds cannot be used for other city departments, such as police and fire services, that are being cut back because of the city’s budget problems.

Tuttle contends that none of this should make any difference, particularly when it comes to business dinners in Los Angeles.

“This is all part of the public funds,” he said. “We think they can find very nice and appropriate settings to have businesslike discussions without going off into these kinds of excessive expenditures.”

Tuttle said he acted now because he had noted a sharp upward trend in the per-person cost of dinners submitted by port officials in recent months.

If the port presses for payment of the dinner expenses, Tuttle said, he will refer the dispute to the City Council for resolution.