Gates Said No to Job as Consultant : LAPD: Councilman Ferraro offered him the position if he would leave early, easing transition for Williams.

The president of the Los Angeles City Council had attempted to speed the retirement of Police Chief Daryl F. Gates by quietly offering him a contract that would have allowed Gates to remain as a consultant to the department, officials said Thursday.

But the effort to expedite the transition of power to Police Chief-designate Willie L. Williams was abandoned in the last few weeks when Gates said he rejected it. Council President John Ferraro confirmed that he pushed the proposal, saying it was an attempt to smooth the change of leadership at the beleaguered Police Department and avoid the necessity of having an acting chief run the LAPD for several weeks.

“We never were able to put it together,” he said, refusing to disclose the amount of the proposed contract or other details of the discussions.

Gates on Thursday confirmed he had been offered a consulting contract. “(Ferraro) said something like, ‘What would it take for you to leave (early)?’ I said, ‘John, I want to stay.’ ” Gates acknowledged that there was “some discussion about a consulting contract.” But he said, “I’m not interested in that. I want to go out when I want to go out.”

The chief also disclosed that he was once again changing his departure plans. He told reporters he would remain on the job at police headquarters until the end of next month because the city’s riots had delayed several of his projects.

Initially, Gates announced last year that he would retire in April. He later said he would remain on the job until the June 2 election, so he could campaign against a series of proposed changes in the LAPD.

In recent weeks, Gates had repeatedly said he would vacate his office immediately after the June 2 election, but remain as chief until his actual retirement at the end of June by taking accrued vacation time.

But because of unfinished work, Gates said Thursday, “I probably won’t be able to take a vacation.”

Ferraro, generally a Gates ally on the council, said his intent had been to get Gates to formally retire June 2, so “Williams could come in as of that date and be full chief.” He said he made the suggestion through a third party that he declined to identify. He said he proposed that Gates be placed on a consulting contract to advise Williams through the month of June.

Gates disclosed his latest shift in plans after an impassioned 1 1/2-hour address to Town Hall of California, in which he:

* Said passage of Charter Amendment F, which would give City Hall more authority over the police chief, would be a “major mistake” that would lead to “political control” of the department and perpetuate a “failure of leadership in this city” during and after the riots.

* Chided President Bush and Mayor Tom Bradley for expressing dismay over the verdicts in the Rodney G. King beating. He said such statements risk “creating a situation that could lead to a revolution in the United States.”

* Compared efforts to include gang members in the rebuilding of riot-torn portions of the city to “getting in bed with terrorists.”

* Said the biggest challenge facing Los Angeles is creating an entirely new “social infrastructure” for inner-city communities that now resemble “Third World countries.”

At the end of his speech, Gates said: “That’s your challenge. I’m going to be living in San Clemente on the beach.”

Gates told reporters later that a field supervisor he has blamed for mishandling the initial response to the recent riots failed to “move people out in riot control mode” quickly enough.

In an interview with The Times, the field supervisor, Lt. Mike Moulin, said that Gates was ultimately responsible for the lack of preparedness and “sold me down the river.”

On Thursday, Moulin stood firmly by his contention that there were no specific preparations at his South Los Angeles station for possible unrest after the verdicts in the King case. There have been standing plans for years, he said, but they had nothing to do with preparing for the King verdicts.

Also Thursday, one of the highest-ranking officers at the LAPD’s South Los Angeles command post on the night the riots broke out denied Moulin’s assertion that there was a paralysis in decision-making by commanders fearful of jeopardizing their careers.

“There was no reluctance on our part to do anything,” said Cmdr. Ron Banks, the second-ranking officer in the Police Department’s South Bureau. “The problem became one of resources, having sufficient resources to respond.”

But Banks agreed with Moulin on one point--that the lieutenant was not responsible for the police response after about 6 p.m. At that time, Capt. Paul Jefferson was directing operations at the command post at 54th Street and Arlington Avenue. Truck driver Reginald O. Denny was pulled from his truck and assaulted nearby at about 6:45 p.m.