Police Plan Loses but Officials Are Upbeat : Propositions: The measure to raise taxes to hire 1,000 officers attracts 63% of the vote in narrow defeat. It is seen as mandate for further efforts to bolster the LAPD.

Despite its defeat at the polls, the strong showing Tuesday of a ballot measure to expand the Los Angeles Police Department will inspire renewed efforts to add police to the 7,800-officer force and will become a central issue in the upcoming mayor’s race, City Hall officials said Wednesday.

Proposition N, the measure to add 1,000 police officers by increasing property taxes, garnered 63% of the vote--far more than a majority but about 4% short of the two-thirds margin needed for approval--in final returns reported early Wednesday. Similar proposals received just 42% of the vote in 1981 and 1985. Noting the strength of the latest vote, City Council members and Mayor Tom Bradley pledged to continue to search for ways to pay for more police.

But officials warned that progress may be slow as the city tries to carry out two other measures approved Tuesday--upgrading the overloaded 911 emergency communications system and transferring airport revenue to the city’s general fund.

Police Chief Willie L. Williams was upbeat Wednesday about the election results, saying support for Proposition N gave a “clear mandate” to elected officials. “I’m very, very pleased that a very clear majority voted in favor of having a stronger, better-prepared LAPD,” he said. “The fact that we didn’t get the last three or four percent was just because of the funding source.”

Bradley quickly pledged ‘to fight for the funds to hire additional police officers by any and all means available.”

Voters did agree to raise property taxes for another police-related measure, approving by 77% Proposition M, which will pay for improvements to the city’s emergency communications system.

The mayor backed measure N to bolster a force that has shrunk from its high of 8,300 officers during a citywide hiring freeze that began in late 1990. Recently, Bradley said that the city has no choice but to continue the freeze to close an estimated $71-million budget deficit, a move that would reduce the force to 7,631 by next year.

No specific proposals to hire additional police emerged Wednesday, but several City Council members reiterated proposals made in recent weeks:

* Michael Woo, who has declared his candidacy for mayor, called for reducing the city’s reserve fund and a trust fund used to build parking lots to restore the force to its previously authorized level of 7,900 officers. He also has said that several hundred officers could be moved out of desk jobs and into the field.

* Joel Wachs, another declared mayoral candidate, called for a $42-million reduction in the city’s sewer maintenance and construction fund to pay for the addition of 650 more officers.

* Hal Bernson, who opposed Proposition N, called for a City Charter amendment to guarantee that the city pay for police and firefighters before all other services. Bernson said the city should hire 10,000 officers by 1997, although he has not specified what city programs should be reduced to make the change.

* Zev Yaroslavsky, a potential mayoral candidate, has called for cuts in staffing at the Planning and Building and Safety departments, saying workloads in those fields has been reduced during the recession. But Yaroslavksy said the City Council should not shy away from raising taxes to pay for more police.

“This vote was a reflection of the public’s general level of anxiety after the riots,” Yaroslavsky said. “There is a heightened sense of danger among the people of this city and they want more protection and they are willing to pay for police.”

The debate over how to make cuts will intensify through current budget hearings and into next April’s mayoral primary, said Rich Lichtenstein, a political consultant who has followed the police issue.

“Police and the economy will be the two hot topics in the mayor’s race,” Lichtenstein said. “That is what is on everyone’s minds.”

Police officials, meanwhile, have begun planning for the improvements in the 911 system approved by voters in the form of a $235-million bond measure.

While 7,000 radios for squad cars and officers can be purchased immediately, it will take from five to seven years to build a new communications system adequate to handle the deluge of 911 calls, said Linda Bunker, the commander of the LAPD’s emergency communications system.

Locations must be found for an operations center in the San Fernando Valley and a backup center, perhaps downtown, before construction can begin, Bunker said.

In the meantime, the department is devising a plan to reroute emergency calls to police stations when the emergency communications network becomes overloaded, she said.

Chief Williams has estimated that more than 300 calls a day to 911 go unanswered.

The backers of Proposition K, to redirect money from Los Angeles International Airport to the city treasury, said they were relieved the measure squeaked by with just over 50% of the vote.

But greater hurdles may be yet to come in attempting to change federal laws and regulations that prohibit the use of airport money for non-aviation purposes, said City Councilwoman Ruth Galanter, Proposition K’s leading backer.

Awaiting Los Angeles lobbyists in Washington will be the powerful airline industry, which opposes fund transfers. The Air Transport Assn., which represents the nation’s major air carriers, has vowed an “intensive” campaign against transfers of airport money to city budgets.

Roger Cohen, a vice president of the association, said such transfers will lead to diminished maintenance and improvements at airports nationwide, a charge that Los Angeles officials have rejected.

If the city prevails, estimates are that the proposition could provide up to $70 million within a few years. A measure is pending before the council that would restrict airport surplus to police and fire uses.

Times staff writer Andrea Ford contributed to this story.