City Promotion Freeze Lifted for Police Dept. : LAPD: The compromise allows the chief to elevate 331 officers into supervisory posts. But no new personnel will be hired.

Police Chief Willie L. Williams on Tuesday won Los Angeles City Council approval to lift a citywide promotional freeze on his department, allowing Williams the latitude to restructure his command as part of a plan to institute community-based policing.

The council’s action came on a 9-to-1 vote even as another member of the body thrust himself into the increasingly fractious debate over police staffing by proposing that the City Charter be amended to guarantee a beefed-up 10,000-officer force. The department currently has 7,800 officers.

The freeze--a budget austerity measure imposed last year--had stood in the way of the new chief’s plans to promote 331 officers into supervisory positions.

The only voice of dissent came from Councilman Ernani Bernardi, who said the promotions in some instances would strip the department of much-needed field officers. He called the council’s action a sham at a time when the city is maintaining its freeze on hiring new officers.

“When police officers retire, they are not going to be replaced,” Bernardi said. “But you are going to replace people in the upper brackets. I can’t believe what I’m hearing.”

The cost of lifting the promotional freeze has been estimated at $1.7 million. Williams initially had sought council approval for a complete lifting of the freeze, which would have allowed him to hire new officers as well as promote from within the department. Tuesday’s vote represented a compromise.

Meanwhile, Councilman Hal Bernson proposed voter passage of a City Charter amendment to guarantee the hiring of 550 police officers each year until the force hits 10,000.

After that goal is reached, the Bernson plan would require the city to automatically increase the police force’s size to keep pace with population. Specifically, the measure would lock the city into having 2.8 officers for every 1,000 residents. The existing ratio is about 2.1 officers per 1,000 residents.

Bernson said he wants the City Council to place the measure before voters in next April’s election, where it would share a spot on the ballot with a long list of candidates expected to run for mayor.

If the council refuses to place his plan on the ballot, Bernson said, he will launch a campaign to collect the nearly 200,000 signatures of voters needed to put it on the ballot via the initiative process.

Supporters of Proposition N, a measure on next Tuesday’s ballot that would implement a property tax hike to pay for the hiring of 1,000 additional officers, immediately denounced the Bernson plan as an illusion. Bernson has signed the ballot arguments against Proposition N.

Last week, Councilman Joel Wachs, a candidate for mayor and another high-profile foe of Proposition N, proposed slashing $42 million from the city’s “bloated” $838-million sewer construction and maintenance fund to hire 650 additional officers.

At a City Hall news conference, Bernson said his proposal would require the LAPD’s voter-approved staffing needs to “be funded first” at budget time, with other city departments--except for the Fire Department--having to wait in line.

Under the Bernson plan, the Fire Department also would get a boost with an additional 100 firefighters and 18 paramedics. Andy Fox, president of the firefighters union, endorsed the Bernson measure.

The San Fernando Valley-based Republican lawmaker said his proposal would have a yearly price tag of about $200 million and require large cuts in other city services--or a major tax hike.

But Bernson made it clear that his preference was that no new taxes be levied and even billed his proposal as a tax-free way to boost the police force. “I know that’s bitter medicine,” Bernson said.

The conservative lawmaker refused to identify the services he would cut, even as he inveighed against council members who annually fund their less pressing “pet projects.”

“I’m not going to get into that guessing game today,” Bernson said as he was repeatedly urged by reporters to disclose what programs he would cut.

John Stodder, campaign manager for Proposition N, said he hoped the Bernson proposal would not mislead voters.

“If people want a bigger Police Department, the only swift, sure way to get that is to vote for Proposition N,” Stodder said.

During the debate over the promotion freeze, Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky, the council’s Finance Committee chairman, also lashed out at the Bernson proposal.

“Bernson’s not telling us what bullet he wants us to bite--it’s disingenuous,” Yaroslavsky said.

The lawmaker, who said he supports Proposition N instead, said the cutbacks that would be needed if Bernson’s proposal were approved would force, for example, closure of the city attorney’s office, and the recreation and parks, planning and street maintenance bureaus.