LOCAL ELECTIONS / L.A. MAYOR : Riordan Ups Ante With $1-Million Check

Los Angeles lawyer-businessman Richard Riordan wrote himself a check for $1 million Friday to help finance his mayoral campaign.

Riordan’s largess was condemned by opponents as an attempt to buy the city’s top job. It is likely to trigger a fund-raising scramble by the other candidates because it raises the cap on individual donations from $1,000 to $7,000.

It could also doom a number of rivals who have been struggling to raise funds in the crowded field to succeed retiring 20-year Mayor Tom Bradley.

The infusion of cash from Riordan’s personal fortune of $100 million to $200 million is expected to help fund a massive TV advertising campaign beginning Monday, aides said.

They would not reveal the content of the commercials, but the spots are expected to highlight Riordan’s core message: that he is the only candidate tough enough to lead the city. Analysts believe that the advertising will target Republican and conservative voters, who have yet to be heavily courted in the campaign.

The advertising would be intended to cure a name identification problem for Riordan, a principal partner in a downtown law firm and a venture capitalist. The lack of recognition was evident in a recent Times poll that showed Riordan badly trailing such better-known candidates as City Councilmen Michael Woo, Joel Wachs and Nate Holden. Some experts believe that with a large field a candidate could get into the June runoff with as little as 17%--and the conservative bloc may be big enough to provide that.

Counting contributions from others, Riordan has raised about $2 million--more than anyone in the field, an aide said.

Once he spends that money, a $2-million spending cap agreed to by all the other candidates for the April primary would be lifted.

The other candidates agreed to the spending cap as the price of receiving public funds to match privately raised contributions under the terms of the city’s new ethics law.

Riordan has said it is wrong to accept such public funds and willaccept none. He is therefore not bound by the $2-million cap.

Riordan’s donation to his campaign had been expected by the other candidates. Riordan has been quoted as saying he is willing to spend $3 million to $5 million of his own money. But his staff declined to provide such figures to The Times.

In a letter to the Ethics Commission on Friday, Riordan said he was writing himself the check “as a matter of principle. . . . I am spending my own money to let voters know who I am, what my ideas are and to communicate with them--without taking a penny of their tax money.”

“Some of my opponents may cry foul,” he added. “But this only shows a contempt for voters who are smarter than the politicians think. People can’t be bought.”

Riordan also pledged in the letter that, if elected, he would forgo all but $1 of the mayor’s $117,876 annual salary.

“I am running for mayor out of an obligation to public service,” he wrote, adding that he is “committed to restoring safety, ending business and middle-class flight and creating good jobs.”

The tone and substance of his letter were condemned by representatives of other campaigns.

“It sounds like a very arrogant letter, written by a very arrogant man,” said Harvey Englander, political consultant to Wachs. “It’s wonderful that he could serve for $1 a year. . . . All the other candidates have to work for a living. By virtue of that, they understand the needs of the average citizens of Los Angeles a lot better.”

“I think the fact that he calls this a matter of principle is outrageous,” said Vicki Rideout, campaign manager for Woo, “because this is a man who is clearly trying to buy this election.”

Noting that Riordan and his law firm have held city and county contracts to provide millions of dollars in legal services, Rideout called Riordan’s comments about an unwillingness to accept public funds “totally disingenuous. I agree with him that the voters are too smart to fall for this.”

She said that Woo--who led in The Times’ February poll with support from 20% of those surveyed--has raised over $1 million and has accepted about $333,000 in matching funds.

In other words, Woo is almost certainly now in second place in the fund-raising race.

One effect of Riordan’s move will be to allow Woo and other candidates to go back to contributors who have given them the legal limit of $1,000 and ask for up to $6,000 more. Representatives of Woo and some other candidates said they intend to do that.

They can do so because Riordan’s donation triggers a technical change in the city’s ethics law. It lifts the legal limit that someone--other than the candidate--can give to any one candidate in a city election from $1,000 to $7,000. If an individual donor wants to spread his money among several candidates, however, he can still give no more than $7,000 total.

UCLA law professor Dan Lowenstein, an expert in campaign finance, said Riordan’s gift to himself illustrates some of the complexities of trying to regulate political giving.

“Obviously, one goal is to have fairness between candidates, to have them playing on a reasonably level playing field,” Lowenstein said.

The clause allows candidates to cope with a rich competitor by raising limits when he gives money to his own campaign. But Lowenstein said that causes other problems by allowing contributors to give more money, perhaps opening the door to undue influence.

“I don’t think there’s necessarily an ideal solution,” he said.

Times staff writers Rich Connell and Frank Clifford contributed to this story.