Battle Over Hermosillo: It’s Just the Start

The Los Angeles City Council’s racially divided debate over the appointment of a fire commissioner gave us a preview of future political discourse in multiracial L.A.

After two days of argument last week, a 9-5 vote killed Mayor Richard Riordan’s nomination of conservative Latino activist Xavier Hermosillo to the Board of Fire Commissioners, which decides overall policy for the Fire Department. It was the mayor’s first defeat, and the end of a short honeymoon.

More important, the battle ripped away the curtain of politeness that usually masks lawmakers’ emotions. In doing so, it exposed the racial divisions that afflict City Council members and the rest of L.A.

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Xavier Hermosillo suffers from a severe ailment known as acute sound biteitis. He is addicted to spouting sound bites whenever a camera approaches. If there were a 12-step program for this ailment--and there should be--Hermosillo would be a charter member. “Hi, I’m Xavier. I talk too much.”

Take, for example, the sound bites he tossed off last month on the CBS show “48 Hours,” as he discussed Mexican-Americans taking political control of that former Mexican colony, California. These are some of his quotes:

“We’re taking it back, house by house, block by block. . . . We have a little saying here: ‘If you’re in California, speak Spanish.’ . . . People ought to wake up and smell the refried beans: Not only are we the majority of the population, but we’re not going anywhere.”

Hermosillo, a public relations man, said his remarks were taken out of context. But I’ve heard him say similar things many other times in an uncompromising and antagonistic manner that shows little respect for the rights of others. After listening to Hermosillo, I find myself hoping that when they do take over, they won’t put him in charge of anything.

This destroy your enemy approach was evident when the city was choosing a successor to Police Chief Daryl F. Gates. As head of a conservative Mexican-American organization, NEWS For America (NEWS stands for north, east, west, south), Hermosillo charged that finalists for the chief’s job, all of them non-Latinos, were guilty of misconduct. The Police Commission found there was no substance to the charges. But the fact that one of Hermosillo’s targets was a highly respected black deputy chief, Bernard C. Parks, left deep and irreparable bitterness in the African-American community.

Riordan was warned against the nomination. But showing extreme political tone-deafness, he went ahead. He figured the canny Councilman Richard Alatorre, his floor general on the issue, would somehow push Hermosillo to victory.

But Mark Ridley-Thomas, an African-American councilman, told me he felt strongly that Riordan “behaved irresponsibly and created unnecessary conflict between African-American and Latino members of the council.” He talked to a number of ethnic groups around the city, urging them to oppose Hermosillo’s nomination.

Ridley-Thomas lobbied colleagues and organized a telephone campaign. Among those receiving calls was a white colleague, Councilman Rudy Svorinich. His district extends from San Pedro, with its large, conservative white population, to South-Central, which is heavily black.

Svorinich and Hermosillo were opponents in the City Council primary last spring. Hermosillo lost and Svorinich went on to defeat the incumbent, Joan Milke Flores.

Svorinich had also warned the Riordan team against nominating Hermosillo. “I said it would bring divisiveness and controversy,” he told me. When Riordan gave him a hard sell, Svorinich agreed to take a second look at Hermosillo. But after Councilman Marvin Braude’s police and fire committee recommended against the nomination, “opposition grew in huge numbers. By the time of the vote Friday, we had more opposition from San Pedro than South Central. It was 10-1. What we were hearing was. . . . This type of in-your-face representation was not a good appointment to heal Los Angeles and bring us together.”

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In the end, Hermosillo’s mouth did him in. But, as Latino Assemblyman Richard Polanco (D-Los Angeles), an increasingly influential politician, told the City Council, “this vote is bigger than Xavier Hermosillo.”

“In many ways, Mr. Hermosillo’s frustrations are a reflection of the concerns of many Latinos in Los Angeles,” he said before Friday’s vote. “Concerns that our voices are excluded from decision-making. . . . Concerns that we are often the scapegoats for the ills of our city . . . and for the ills of the state’s economy.”

The City Council’s vote was not a rejection of those concerns. Rather, it was a stand for moderation as ethnic groups battle for power. As Polanco said, “We must learn to be patient and understanding and sensitive.”