VOICES : Issue: The Tenure of Mayor Tom Bradley

What has Tom Bradley accomplished during his 19 years as mayor?

Jimmy Tokeshi, Regional director, Pacific Southwest District, Japanese-American Citizens League

Bradley was a real coalition-builder. We don’t know how much we’ll miss him until after he’s gone. He’s been good for the community. He had a hand in bringing Police Chief Willie Williams in, which is a nice promise of the direction the city needs to go in. He had an ability to bring people together. He was doing that long before the riots give us a reason to be working together. With all the problems the city faces, you can’t look to the mayor’s office--you have to look to the state and national levels. It’s unfair to rest all of the city’s problems on one pair of shoulders. Bradley’s been in public service for something like 50 years. That kind of dedication is really hard to find. We’re just not going to find individuals like that very often. We need to be able to start believing in things again. Bradley made us do that. We need someone to communicate his kind of multicultural vision to face the challenges ahead.

Luke Williams, Worker at El Rescate, a Central-American refugee agency in Pico-Union

Historically, Bradley has really been a source of pride for the African-American community. He opened major political doors in L.A. Now he’s opening a chance for new leadership. There have been a lot of constraints placed on Bradley. He did make an effort early in his administration to open up City Hall. You have to give him credit for the access he created. A lot of attention has been given to redeveloping Downtown. Now it’s time for local government to focus on neglected neighborhoods like South-Central and Pico-Union. They need affordable housing, education and job creation. It’ll really a challenge for whoever comes in, to bring together people of all colors. The Westside can’t continue to control L.A., to have only their kids take advantage of good schooling and other opportunities. There must be a mandate of equal opportunity for a multicultural city.

Ramsess, Artist and owner of Ramsess Ink in Leimert Park

Bradley had a strong contribution in bringing the city together as a family, but then got sidetracked by big interests and forgot about small people like me. What about people in the middle, not senior citizens or children? We need someone fighting for everyone. Bradley started to lose touch before the Olympics, in the early 1980s, when Police Chief Daryl Gates came into office. Bradley had no power over the police. He should have been a buffer between them and the community, but he flip-flopped on some issues and started looking at big interests. He started getting a paycheck, being a diplomat. You truly cannot please everybody, but you must have your own vision and not be swayed. Mayoral terms should be more limited, to motivate politicians to do something constructive in the time they’re given.

Evangeline Nichols Ordaz, Attorney, Legal Aid Foundation, East L.A. office

Bradley started out very idealistic 20 years ago, with a lot of good ideas for improving conditions for people of color. But he tried to represent everybody, sectors of society that were antithetical to each other. He didn’t succeed in catering to everybody; he made choices detrimental to poor people and people of color. The fact he’s black actually hurt him. Non-blacks pointed to him and said to the black community, “What’s the problem? You have representation in a black mayor.” Still, he had to make tough choices. This is what’s happening to politicians. It’s the nature of politics to be forced to cater to certain sectors of society. Bradley isn’t cutting-edge anymore, he’s a diplomat. The ideal person I have in mind for mayor isn’t even in politics. And people in general aren’t terribly optimistic. The ones I encourage to register to vote are saying, “Why vote?”