ELECTIONS / L.A. CITY COUNCIL : Hall, Alarcon Hurl Race-Related Allegations

Both sides hurled race-baiting accusations Thursday in the suddenly bitter Los Angeles City Council battle between Lyle Hall and Richard Alarcon.

Hall accused an Alarcon worker of falsely telling voters that Hall belongs to the Ku Klux Klan. Alarcon’s press spokesman renewed a charge that Hall told a Lake View Terrace audience that “Mexicans are taking over,” which Hall denies making.

Hall, an Anglo running against the Latino Alarcon in the heavily minority 7th Council District in the northeastern San Fernando Valley, said an Alarcon campaigner had gone door-to-door telling residents that Hall is a klan member.

Alarcon denied that his campaigner had made such an accusation, adding that the notion Hall is in the klan is “ridiculous.”

Hall, a retired city fire captain, and Alarcon, formerly Mayor Tom Bradley’s top Valley aide, are locked in an increasingly fierce struggle for the seat being vacated by Councilman Ernani Bernardi, who retires this month after 32 years on the council.

The candidates’ vitriolic exchange marked an abrupt change in tone in their race, which had been relatively polite and issue-oriented until recent days. Both candidates have said repeatedly that ethnicity should not be a factor in voters’ decision-making. The district’s population is nearly 80% Latino and African-American.

But Thursday, Hall and Alarcon both bemoaned the injection of race into the campaign even as they hurled race-related allegations at one another.

Hall’s campaign manager, Bob Stiens, acknowledged that he is concerned that Hall could be damaged by the KKK charge as the campaign enters its final five days.

“We want to kill this thing,” said Stiens. “I want to make sure it doesn’t hurt. Never leave a charge unanswered in politics.”

Political consultant Marc Litchman, who is familiar with East Valley politics, said of the candidates’ charges: “I don’t believe either of them.

“It sounds like a close race. It sounds like they’re both tired. It’s sounds like they’re both stretched. It’s psychobabble,” he said.

Stiens noted that campaign finance records show that the Alarcon worker who purportedly spread the KKK story was paid $710 by Alarcon’s campaign. The Times could not reach the man through the phone book or local voter records.

Alarcon acknowledged that the man had been paid to run his absentee voter program, but said he apparently is not now on the campaign payroll. He said he did not have a phone number for the man.

Stiens supplied news reporters with the names of two district residents who he said were told by the Alarcon worker that Hall is a KKK member. But Stiens acknowledged that both residents are Hall supporters.

One of them, Bob Winn, a black city employee from Lake View Terrace, said he went to a local grocery store recently, where a black man stood outside behind an ironing board bracketed by Alarcon campaign posters.

Winn said the man told him: “Hey, brother, I want you to help me get rid of this klansman,” referring to Hall.

Stiens said that several weeks ago the Alarcon loyalist asked for a job on Hall’s campaign but was turned down.

“He went off on a tirade because we wouldn’t hire him,” Stiens said. “We had the campaign office door locked, and he was shaking the door trying to get in.”

Alarcon said he talked to his campaigner Wednesday night and the man denied calling Hall a klansman.

Alarcon said he was satisfied the man was telling the truth but warned him he “didn’t want any of that in this campaign.”

Alarcon angrily charged that Hall was attacking him “to salvage a losing campaign.” He said Hall’s allegations are not credible because the only purported witnesses to the KKK story are both Hall partisans.

“The community deserves better than subtle messages . . . trying to drum up hatemongers,” he said.

Hall, who also decried the use of race-baiting tactics, stopped short of accusing Alarcon of spreading the KKK story as a deliberate campaign strategy.

He insisted that more than one Alarcon campaigner has spread the KKK story among voters, but said he does not know their names.

“I’m not willing to accuse him at this point without identifying the other people,” Hall said.

Alarcon’s press secretary, Leo Briones, reiterated a charge that Hall, in a reference to Alarcon’s candidacy, told a campaign audience in Lake View Terrace that “Mexicans are taking over.”

Hall said that was “absolutely false.”