Chances Dim for Proposal to Ban Gangs From Parks : Crime: Councilmen Braude and Bernson drop their support, saying the LAPD persuaded them that the ordinance would be unenforceable. Council may kill the measure today.

With police administrators calling the proposal unenforceable, the Los Angeles City Council on Tuesday backed away from an ordinance that would have banned gang members from parks, playgrounds and beaches.

The council is expected to return the proposal to committee or kill it outright today after a switch by two of the measure’s key backers, who said they now believe that it would not work.

After discussing it with police officials, Councilmen Hal Bernson and Marvin Braude said they were persuaded that something other than an outright ban will be more effective at keeping dangerous gang members out of the city’s public facilities.

Bernson, citing a Sunday gang fight that caused police to clear thousands of visitors from Venice Beach, says he is still committed to addressing the matter. “This problem is getting worse, not better. The question is what can we do that is legal and enforceable.”

The ordinance would have made it a misdemeanor for gang members with two or more serious crimes on their records to enter any park, beach or playground with the intent of engaging in gang activity.

But Assistant Police Chief Bernard Parks told the City Council that the proposed law would put an impossible burden on police officers.

“It is very difficult, almost impossible, to have field officers identify gang members,” Parks said. “And second, it is very difficult, almost impossible, to enforce laws on a specific intent that individuals might have when they come to public facilities.”

Parks said the department would prefer to continue arresting people for specific violations of the law. He promised that the Police Department will work with the City Council to improve safety at parks, beaches and playgrounds.

The council was sharply divided Tuesday; some members, such as Mike Hernandez, argued for killing the plan outright. Others, including Bernson, called for looking at other ways to curtail gang use of public facilities.

With no majority on either side Tuesday, the matter will automatically be returned to the council floor today.

But it is not expected to fare well in the second go-round. Four of the five council members who missed Tuesday’s meeting--most of whom appeared with President Clinton at a series of events--are liberals who are expected to vote against the gang ban.

Allan Parachini, spokesman for the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California, which opposed the ban, said he believed Tuesday’s vote represents the death of the gang proposal. He praised the council, saying that a ban “would have no impact on reducing gang problems.”

“I don’t know when the ACLU and the LAPD have been before you on the same side of an issue,” said Parachini, whose organization agreed with LAPD’s Parks.

“Inevitably, there are going to be kids, mostly kids of color, jacked up and jacked around and taken to jail, cases of mistaken identity with kids who are not gang members,” he added.

Hernandez called the gang ban “ridiculous.” He asked, “Why don’t we just have a ban on our streets so we don’t have drive-by shootings?

“The message we are giving to these young people is that we don’t care, that they shouldn’t have positive choices of things to do.”

Refugio Martinez, a former gang member, validated this sentiment. “Why don’t you get some jobs for us, some programs?” Martinez asked council members. “Then we won’t be kicking it in the park.”

Although the city attorney’s office said the ordinance would pass constitutional muster, Councilman Nate Holden predicted that the legal opinion would fall apart as a result of slipshod or unequal enforcement. “I think this law is unconstitutional,” he said. “Let’s put it on the table and hold it there.”

Only Councilman Ernani Bernardi of the San Fernando Valley, who proposed the ordinance, argued for the law as written.

“The Police Department is not doing a good job anywhere in the city of Los Angeles,” Bernardi said. “The Police Department ignores the parks completely.”