Farrakhan’s Group in Line for Security Pact : Patrol: Nation of Islam would protect apartment buildings in Venice. Jewish leaders renew protests over the federal contract.

The federal government has approved a contract with a security company affiliated with the Rev. Louis Farrakhan’s Nation of Islam organization to patrol 15 subsidized apartment buildings in Venice, reigniting a controversy with Jewish leaders.

A spokesman for the building owners, Alliance Housing Management Inc. of Los Angeles, said the company is nearing agreement with Nation of Islam’s security branch to provide unarmed night patrols at the 256 Holiday Venice apartments. The buildings, sprinkled amid funky older bungalows and shiny new condominiums in the gentrifying Oakwood neighborhood, are a hub for drug dealing and have been the site of sporadic gang violence.

“It’s probably as good as a done deal,” said Ron Nelson, spokesman for Alliance Housing. A similar proposal stalled six months ago amid sharp criticism from Jewish groups, but Nation of Islam Security’s $53,676-a-month proposal was the cheapest acceptable bid of seven offered in a second round. Nelson said the group could be on the job by early September.

It would be Nation of Islam’s first contract to patrol federally assisted housing in California and is believed to be only their third nationwide, according to officials at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, which monitored and approved bidding for the Venice security contract two weeks ago.

Alliance’s bid request called for seven pairs of guards to patrol the 15 buildings overnight from Wednesday through Sunday. Alliance vice president David Itkin assured HUD officials in a letter that the contract would bar “the solicitation and sale of any products or the proselytizing of residents.” The fee would be paid through subsidized rent hikes, which must be approved by HUD, Nelson said. He said the security agency would work on a month-to-month basis.

Jewish leaders, who consider Farrakhan’s teachings anti-Semitic and racist, have renewed protests over the proposal.

Abraham H. Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith, wrote to HUD Secretary Jack Kemp on Wednesday, saying “it would be as inappropriate for the Ku Klux Klan or any other racist group to be providing security under government contract as it would for the Nation of Islam.” He also questioned whether the security agency would meet federal equal-opportunity employment requirements for government contractors.

Irv Rubin, leader of the Jewish Defense League, said his group will send patrols into the Oakwood neighborhood to counter Nation of Islam if he fails to block the contract.

A HUD spokesman in Washington said he had not seen the ADL letter Wednesday but that any reports of anti-Semitism or racism by a contractor would be “investigated and dealt with.”

Calls to Nation of Islam representatives were not returned.

Although Holiday Venice tenant activist Regina Hyman, who first proposed hiring Nation of Islam, said she did not know that the contract appears close at hand, the proposal drew conflicting reactions from other residents.

Melvyn Hayward, a resident manager of one of the apartment buildings on Brooks Avenue, said that by offering a positive example to young people, the group might succeed in stopping crime where police and previous security measures have failed.

“They’re some good clean brothers, plus they’re going to raise the consciousness without all the violence,” he said. “They’ll be more effective than the police.” Hayward dismissed criticism by Jewish groups as outside interference.

But Johnny Moss, who lives in another building, worried that the Farrakhan group’s militant philosophy might promote animosity toward non-blacks, especially Jews, in the racially mixed neighborhood. He feared that unarmed guards might be overwhelmed by gun-packing gangsters.

“The first time they step on the toes of a major drug dealer, they’re going to get shot,” Moss said.

Simmering tensions over gentrification in the once predominantly black neighborhood bubbled over during the city’s recent civil unrest. Several new condominiums were vandalized--one was torched--and a bicyclist was beaten by suspected gang members, police said. Raids last month by a Los Angeles police gang detail at the Holiday Venice apartments and other Oakwood homes resulted in 22 arrests on charges stemming from looting, the beating and other incidents, said Capt. Jan Carlson of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Pacific Division.

Frustrated with stubborn crime, Hyman and other tenants last year pressed Alliance to hire Farrakhan’s group, whose bow-tied representatives had visited the neighborhood to sell bean pies and distribute literature promoting black pride and self-reliance.

After talks with tenants and representatives from HUD and Nation of Islam, Alliance was close to hiring Nation of Islam in December but backtracked after the Jewish protests. HUD officials, saying that the original bidding was not done properly, directed Alliance to seek new bids.

Because HUD subsidizes rents at the complexes, it oversees bidding but does not directly approve the companies hired, said John Phillips, a spokesman in HUD’s regional office in San Francisco.

“(Alliance) followed a reasonable process and one that would meet our contracting criteria,” Phillips said.

Nation of Islam Security was licensed by the state’s Department of Consumer Affairs in May, according to a department spokeswoman. Attempts to reach the registered manager of the security agency, Ishmael R. Graham of Los Angeles, were unsuccessful.

Four years ago, Nation of Islam won contracts to patrol two HUD-assisted apartment complexes in Washington and was credited with having pushed out drug dealers. But some police officers said that any success there came from the presence of extra police sent to protect the Muslims from threats of violence.

Nelson said the management company has noted favorable reports of Nation of Islam’s security work on the East Coast. Farrakhan followers trained in martial arts also have provided security for such high-profile figures as the Rev. Jesse Jackson and film director Spike Lee.

“If they can do the job, I don’t care who they are,” Nelson said. “It’s going to be controversial any which way you look at it--no matter whose name is on the badge.”