LOCAL ELECTIONS / L.A. MAYOR : Riordan, Woo Compete for Women Voters : Politics: Support among abortion rights advocates is stressed by both candidates. Councilman also tries to focus attention on South L.A., saying he has the better plan.

Los Angeles mayoral candidate Richard Riordan, seeking to improve his appeal among women voters and minimize political damage caused by his contributions to anti-abortion groups, showed off his support Thursday from women who favor abortion rights.

“I’m supporting Dick Riordan because he too believes in a woman’s right to choose,” Susan Humphreville, a board member of Planned Parenthood, said at a news conference of about 25 women at a San Fernando Valley women’s clinic.

In another development in the mayoral race, Riordan’s rival, City Councilman Michael Woo, sent members of his staff to a community meeting at which they affirmed Woo’s commitment to a revised campaign agenda for South Los Angeles.

Riordan staged his news conference in an effort to overcome a gender gap in the race, which has entered its final weeks. A recent Los Angeles Times poll showed the attorney-businessman leading Woo 48% to 40% among male registered voters, but trailing among women, 32% to 48%.

Although the issue of abortion has only marginal relevance to the mayor’s duties, Woo has embraced it as part of his effort to portray Riordan as an ultraconservative who has undergone a political face lift.

In TV ads and mailers targeted at women, Woo has cited Riordan’s $10,000 contribution in 1991 to the anti-abortion group Americans United for Life. But although Woo has made much of the abortion issue, only 2% of anti-Riordan voters and 3% of women who dislike Riordan said they oppose him because they believe he is against abortion rights, according to the Times poll.

“I’ll state again,” Riordan said Thursday. “I’m pro-choice. . . . As mayor, I will work with the chief of police to make certain that every woman has access to the clinics.”

Riordan, saying he is no ideologue, said he also contributed to politicians and groups that support abortion rights.

The Woo campaign dismissed Riordan’s latest statements as a continuing charade intended to deceive voters.

“If I was a woman and I was concerned about the issue of choice,” Woo spokesman Garry South said, “I would wonder why Dick Riordan gave $10,000 to an anti-choice group. He refuses to answer that.”

Woo was also reaching out to women voters on the campaign trail, holding a “Women for Woo” fund-raiser Thursday night at the Beverly Hills home of a supporter. South called the gathering “a coming together of women of all walks of life” and added: “I think you’ll find it is a much more impressive assemblage of women than at the Dick Riordan press conference.”

Among those expected to attend was Tammy Bruce, president of the Los Angeles chapter of the National Organization for Women. Although she has not yet decided to support Woo--”I’m not inspired by either one of them”--Bruce said she could not vote for Riordan because of doubts about his commitment to women’s issues.

At Riordan’s event, several women supporters said Riordan personally assured them that he firmly supports abortion rights. But they said their support is also rooted in the candidate’s pledge to make the city and its schools safer and his record of opening up business opportunities for women.

One supporter, black attorney Deidre Hughes Hill, recalled a meeting she had several years ago with Riordan at the private California Club in downtown Los Angeles.

“I learned at that time that Dick had been instrumental in opening the doors of the exclusive club so that I could be just the first of many women--and African-American women in particular--to be allowed into the inner sanctum.” Although she is not a member, Hill said that Riordan played a key role in changing a policy that restricted women to one room.

Hill said that the pivotal issue for her in supporting Riordan is economic development. “I’m most concerned about the inner city. . . . I think Riordan has the political and business contacts to make Rebuild L.A. a reality,” she said.

One woman being aggressively courted by both camps is Linda Griego, a former deputy mayor and the only politically prominent female candidate in the April primary election. Griego, who made abortion rights an issue in the primary, said she has met with both candidates but not yet decided if she will issue an endorsement before the June 8 runoff.

“I think women voters are particularly interested in open government--not tokenism, a slot here and a slot there,” Griego said. She said her supporters are divided between the two camps, although she believes more support Woo.

Meanwhile, Woo’s staffers met Thursday night with about 20 African-American community leaders on the revised South Los Angeles agenda.

The revisions called for opposition to any proposals for contracting out city government services that would lead to a loss of jobs held by black employees. Woo’s revised plan states that privatization of sanitation services would jeopardize 1,500 jobs held by residents of South-Central Los Angeles.

Riordan has proposed contracting out residential garbage collection as a means of reducing the city’s budget deficit.

Woo’s plan also pledges support for the proposed Crenshaw rail transit corridor to ensure that South-Central receives its fair share of $183 billion in federal transit funds for Los Angeles over the next 30 years.

Other recommendations in Woo’s plan focus on law enforcement and call for supporting the truce between gangs and to pay for “gang-initiated youth programs using revenue from the Community Restoration Project.” Formerly known as the federal “Weed and Seed” program, the project is aimed at eradicating drugs and gangs.

Councilman Mark Ridley-Thomas, Woo’s principal ally in South Los Angeles, chaired the meeting at Messiah Baptist Church. He said the plan distinguishes Woo as the candidate with a specific agenda for the city’s African-American community.

“The point is, Riordan doesn’t have a plan,” Ridley-Thomas said.

The plan released Thursday represents an expansion of a 10-page agenda for South Los Angeles issued jointly by Woo and Ridley-Thomas during the mayoral primary. At the time, Ridley-Thomas said he was endorsing Woo on the condition that the candidate promise to deliver on the recommendations. The agenda outlined proposals on economic development, transportation, public works and public safety.

Riordan, meanwhile, spent Thursday night at a fund-raiser, a massive affair at the Century Plaza Hotel that drew hundreds of guests at $1,000 a head, and raised an estimated $1.3 million, according to campaign officials.

Times staff writer Frank Clifford contributed to this story.