An Intriguing Latina Politico to Be Reckoned With

Linda Griego didn’t answer all of my questions about tomorrow’s mayoral election when we met for lunch the other day. But the onetime candidate for mayor was fairly candid about two aspects of the battle between Richard Riordan and Mike Woo.

First, she didn’t like either of the men enough to endorse one of them. “I guess I don’t view myself as a politician who endorses simply for the sake of endorsing,” she said.

But she did advance a prediction.

“Riordan, but I think it’ll be very close,” she said.

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In the beginning, few paid attention to Griego, a native of New Mexico who operates the Engine Co. No. 28 restaurant downtown. She was just one of the 52 people who took out nominating papers to succeed Tom Bradley as mayor.

But in the three months leading up to the April primary, her candidacy caught on with professional women, Latinos and small-business owners. Latinas took particular pride in Griego’s try for mayor, her first run for elective office.

With Gloria Molina declining to make the race, Griego easily outdistanced former Los Angeles school board member Julian Nava as the top Latino vote-getter in the primary, with a campaign that touted her business background and the fact that she was the only politically prominent woman in a male-dominated race.

She received 7% of the vote, coming in a respectable fifth among the 24 candidates on the ballot. Nava got just 1%. She also outpolled other, initially better-known candidates such as L.A. parks and recreation commissioner Stan Sanders; City Council members Nate Holden and Ernani Bernardi, and transportation expert and businessman Nick Patsaouras.

Griego, 46, a former deputy mayor under Tom Bradley, remains an intriguing political figure, especially because she isn’t part of the Latino rivalry game that pits Molina against Democratic state Sen. Art Torres and L.A. City Councilman Richard Alatorre.

None of this appeal was lost on Riordan or Woo. Both sensed that Griego was a candidate who--like Sanders--was considered a winner although she didn’t make the runoff. The two have persistently sought her endorsement, but she has firmly said no.

So, while enjoying a shrimp, bacon and lettuce sandwich at the Boyd Street Grill on Skid Row, Griego explained her reasons for staying neutral.

Riordan, she concluded, “just isn’t the kind of leader I see for Los Angeles right now.”

She said, among other things, that she was bothered by Riordan’s explanations about his three arrests, two for driving under the influence, in the 1960s and ‘70s. Grown-ups, she explained, just don’t forget whether they had two or three arrests like the ones Riordan had. “He was in his 40s when all this stuff happened, right?” she asked.

Woo is more palatable to her, but he lacks the diversity of experience--like the kind she has gained in running the restaurant--she thinks the next mayor of L.A. ought to have. “All of his experience has been in government,” she explained.

She also fears he may be too indecisive.

The negative tone of the recent campaigning has only reinforced her decision to withhold an endorsement.

Although she gives Riordan the edge because of his get-tough messages and support in the voter-rich San Fernando Valley, Griego thinks Woo could still win if:

* Blacks turn out in large numbers tomorrow to vote for him. Although he has not gotten the endorsements of retiring Mayor Tom Bradley and Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters, several get-out-the-vote telephone banks are likely to target voters in the inner city. A sign of this effort, Griego said, will be whether she and her neighbors in Mark Ridley-Thomas’ 8th Council District get, in the final days, at least three telephone calls urging them to vote.

* Woo can raise enough doubts about Riordan in the final days. Griego figures that the millionaire businessman has lost some support because of the disclosures about his three arrests. If Woo can raise other doubts about Riordan, he may have enough to eke a victory.

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So, what’s next for Griego? Friends suggest she might consider a run for a statewide job such as secretary of state. Perhaps a try for Congress.

She was coy about it when I asked. But I got the sense at the end of lunch that she wouldn’t back away from running against tomorrow’s winner in four years because neither man has won her over.