House OKs Aid for L.A., Despite Foes : Congress: Unexpected, strong opposition fails to derail $494.6-million bill in 244-162 vote. Fourteen Republican California lawmakers oppose measure. Package includes help for Chicago.

In a sign of trouble ahead for costly urban aid programs, the House on Thursday overcame unexpectedly strong opposition before approving an initial $494.6 million for disaster loans and relief payments for riot-scarred Los Angeles and flood-damaged Chicago.

The emergency measure, which had the backing of President Bush, was expected to sail through the House with only a handful of negative votes as a down payment on a bipartisan package of aid to hard-pressed and racially tense cities. But the margin of approval was a much slimmer 244 to 162.

Notable among those who cast their votes against the bill were 14 Republican members of the California delegation, most of whom represent largely rural districts. Twenty-four Democrats and three Republicans from the state voted for it.

Opponents argued it would set a bad precedent for extending federal aid for man-made calamities rather than natural disasters, and a few critics charged that providing such assistance might encourage urban terrorism in the future.

“Just shoveling in money won’t solve the problem--we need fundamental reforms,” complained Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Long Beach), who voted against the bill.

In contrast, Rep. Vic Fazio (D-West Sacramento) strongly backed the legislation, saying: “The money we provide today will restore the face of Los Angeles but it is now up to the Congress and the White House to heal its heart.”

The bill would provide $169.6 million to the Small Business Administration that the agency can use to generate $500 million worth of disaster loans. Another $300 million would go to the Federal Emergency Management Agency for direct relief payments, with $22 million for government-guaranteed loans.

Most of the money was expected to go to help Los Angeles recover from riots and assist Chicago with multimillion-dollar damage resulting from a tunnel leak that allowed river water to knock out power and shut stores and offices in the downtown district. Other areas suffering from disasters also would benefit, however, since the appropriations would be sent to a central fund.

A few lawmakers expressed concern that the emergency bill would mark the end, rather than the beginning, of measures to funnel significant aid to the cities.

House Minority Whip Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), who also voted against the bill, said: “There’s no sentiment in suburban and rural America to send a lot of money to inner-city mayors.”

Members of Congress “went back home (to their districts) and there was not an awful lot of sympathy for sending money anywhere,” Gingrich said in an attempt to explain the vote.

Rep. Christopher Cox (R-Newport Beach), another opponent, said he favored a form of enterprise zones for the worst-off areas, in which they would be freed of all forms of taxes, including sales taxes and income taxes, for a five-year period.

Such an approach, he suggested, would produce a “surge of economic activity” that would provide greater benefits for inner-cities than other federal programs have done.

Appraising the outcome, Rep. Dave Nagle (D-Iowa), who is close to the Democratic leadership, noted: “This indicates our urban aid package will have tougher sledding than we thought.”

Another potential problem loomed in the Senate, where liberal Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) teamed with conservative Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) to introduce an amendment to the emergency money bill that would add $1.45 billion for summer jobs, summer Head Start programs, education aid and a Bush Administration crime-fighting initiative in urban areas.

“The kind of action we are talking about would be only a small part of the total federal budget but it can be a large down payment on the future of America,” Kennedy said in a statement. “If we have the will, we can certainly find the wallet.”

But while supporting the House bill, the Bush Administration has warned that expanding the measure to include unrelated items would bring “undesirable conflict or stalemate” in the federal government’s response to the need for disaster funds.

A statement from the Office of Management and Budget stopped short of threatening a presidential veto of an expanded measure but said unrelated add-ons would be “highly regrettable.”

The Kennedy-Hatch amendment also could open the door to other additions to the bill which conceivably might pass the Senate but encounter difficulty in the House, especially if Bush opposed them or issued a veto warning. The President has asked Congress to approve a six-point program to help cities in distress, including tax incentives to encourage business investment in poor areas, subsidies to promote home ownership among low-income residents and changes in the welfare program to promote self-reliance.

While Democratic congressional leaders have agreed on the broad outlines of an urban aid package, the details and the key question of how to pay for it remain to be worked out as Congress considers housing, welfare and tax legislation in coming weeks.

While the White House has set no deadline, many key lawmakers believe the package must clear Capitol Hill by the end of June before the Democrats hold their presidential nominating convention in New York City and the election campaign takes on added momentum.

A few signs of partisan strain were evident Thursday when Housing Secretary Jack Kemp testified on the President’s program before the Senate Banking Committee, chaired by Sen. Donald W. Riegle Jr. (D-Mich.).

Kemp and Riegle got into a shouting match over the extent of Bush’s commitment to the urban program, with Riegle expressing skepticism over whether the White House would follow through and Kemp loudly defending Bush’s sincerity.

The dramatic split in the California delegation also illustrated the lack of a bipartisan spirit, at least on the disaster funds.

On the Republican side, only Reps. Jerry Lewis of Redlands, Bill Lowery of San Diego and Tom Campbell of Palo Alto voted for the bill. Rep. William E. Dannemeyer of Fullerton and Rep. Ron Packard of Oceanside did not vote, but all other GOP lawmakers in the state delegation opposed the bill.

With the exception of Rep. Mel Levine (D-Santa Monica) and Rep. Mervyn M. Dymally (D-Compton), who did not vote, the other California Democrats all voted for the aid bill.

Vote on Disaster Assistance

WASHINGTON--Here is how members of the California delegation voted on an emergency appropriations bill to provide $494.6 million for disaster loans and emergency relief payments to alleviate riot damage in Los Angeles and flood damage in Chicago:

Democrats for--Anderson, Beilenson, Berman, Boxer, Brown, Condit, Dellums, Dixon, Dooley, Edwards, Fazio, Lantos, Lehman, Martinez, Matsui, Miller, Mineta, Panetta, Pelosi, Roybal, Stark, Torres, Waters, Waxman

Republicans for--Campbell, Lewis, Lowery

Democrats against--None

Republicans against--Cox, Cunningham, Doolittle, Dornan, Dreier, Gallegly, Herger, Hunter, Lagomarsino, McCandless, Moorhead, Riggs, Rohrabacher, Thomas

Democrats not voting--Dymally, Levine

Republicans not voting--Dannemeyer, Packard

RELATED STORIES, PICTURES: B1, B3