U.S. Likely to Help City Gird for Verdicts

The Clinton Administration is expected to give the financially strapped city of Los Angeles as much as $1.7 million in federal funds to establish a highly visible police presence in the days before the verdicts are announced in the Rodney G. King civil rights trial, Administration officials said Tuesday.

The money, which would pay police overtime costs, is part of an emerging Administration plan for responding to the King trial and the city’s underlying problems. It includes a special task force headed by Commerce Secretary Ronald H. Brown to monitor the aftermath of the trial and to coordinate long-term efforts by federal agencies to revitalize South-Central Los Angeles and revive the California economy in general.

Brown is scheduled to fly to Los Angeles this weekend and Atty. Gen. Janet Reno is likely to visit soon, according to Administration officials. They said a trip by President Clinton is under consideration, although none is planned at the moment.

“We will look at a number of ways to help Los Angeles, not only to head off a potential crisis, but also to help coordinate federal assistance both in the specific short term and the longer term,” said Dee Dee Myers, White House press secretary. “We’re not just going in to help them damp down potential disturbances from the second King trial and then forget about them as has been done in the past.”

The funds to pay for police overtime would come from Federal Emergency Law Enforcement Assistance grants handled by the Department of Justice. That money is traditionally used to reimburse local communities for law-enforcement costs after emergencies or disasters, such as the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake and last year’s Los Angeles riots.

Initially, Mayor Tom Bradley asked for $2 million from the Federal Emergency Management Administration to pay for police overtime. But agency officials turned down the request, explaining that by law they are able to release money only after a disaster has occurred.

Bradley took his case to Washington last month in a meeting with Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry G. Cisneros, who made a special appeal to the President for help, Administration officials said. The White House then directed Justice Department officials to find ways to provide the money.

The department recently urged Gov. Pete Wilson’s office to apply for the law enforcement assistance grants available for the current fiscal year, said Richard Andrews, director of the state office of emergency services.

The paperwork will be filed by the end of the week, Andrews said. But the $1.7 million available from the Justice Department would fall short of the city’s needs; Los Angeles police officials estimate it will cost $1.5 million per day to fully deploy its officers, Wilson aides said.

While no decisions have been made by the Justice Department, Los Angeles is expected to receive most, if not all, of the $1.7 million, Administration officials said.

“The governor wants to use the money to deploy law-enforcement personnel before any potential trouble develops and to send a strong message that a repeat of last year will not be tolerated,” said spokesman Franz Wisner.

Bradley was traveling in Europe on a trade mission Tuesday and could not be reached for comment.

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles), who represents the South-Central area, said she was unaware of the planned federal assistance and maintained that it is misdirected.

“All of that is Band-Aid to me, after the fact, and it’s not visionary,” Waters said.

Instead of spending the money on police overtime in anticipation of trouble that Waters said she does not expect to occur, the federal efforts should focus on vocational and remedial training for people between the ages of 17 and 30, Waters said.

“I focus on prevention and how to invest in the human potential,” Waters said. “That’s what stops riots.”

Since taking office in January, the Clinton Administration has wrestled with how to develop a major urban-aid program for areas such as South-Central Los Angeles.

During Senate confirmation hearings, Cisneros was the first to call for an interagency task force that would marshal the powers of several agencies to fight crime and improve health care, education, job training and housing in the nation’s inner cities.

In a later interview, Cisneros said South-Central Los Angeles would probably be the centerpiece of such a program. But in recent talks Cisneros has mentioned Los Angeles as one of five urban areas--along with Baltimore, Atlanta, Miami and Chicago--as his personal top priorities.

Last month, the President asked Cisneros to head the federal team charged with cleaning up the southern Florida region hit hard by Hurricane Andrew. Those responsibilities have left him largely unavailable to focus on Los Angeles.

“It would be seen as a slap in the face to people in Miami if they pulled Cisneros off of Dade County problems and sent him to Los Angeles,” a White House official said.

Enter Ronald Brown.

It makes sense for the commerce secretary to lead the effort, Myers said, because much of the goal is to revive business. In addition, “he knows a lot of players out there” and is in a good position to work with them.

The federal aid for Los Angeles is part of a larger package for California currently under discussion within the Administration. The elements of a longer-term plan would include summer jobs, job training, education, community development and funding public-works projects.

Times staff writers David Lauter, Gebe Martinez and Ronald J. Ostrow contributed to this story.