Mayor Ready to Declare LAPD Impasse

A frustrated Mayor Richard Riordan announced Monday that the city will declare an impasse in police contract negotiations today unless an eleventh-hour deal is reached, a move that would empower the city to impose a contract on officers.

Pessimistic that an agreement could be hammered out, city officials were set to inform the state Employee Relations Board this morning that they could not reach agreement with the Police Protective League despite intensive talks in recent weeks.

“The response to the city’s good-faith efforts by some of the police union leadership has been exasperating,” Riordan said. “They have resorted to name-calling and intimidation tactics rather than sticking to the tough job of finding a solution.”

Riordan, who was surrounded by seven City Council members at an afternoon news conference, invited the union to meet with the mediator and city representatives throughout the night Monday to try to reach a deal.

But union officials refused to say whether they would take Riordan up on his offer. Declining to comment on the day’s developments, the union said it would make a statement this morning, when officers plan to march to City Hall en masse to show their discontent.

An impasse would send the labor dispute, which stretches back nearly two years, into a fact-finding process in which a state official will hear both sides in a courtroom-like setting and rule on a fair deal.

The city would have the upper hand once an impasse is declared because it could decide to accept the fact finder’s recommendation or impose its own last offer.

The breakdown in talks came after a contentious weekend. Several sources in the dispute said Friday that mediator John M. Caraway had recommended pay increases totaling 9% over the next 18 months, along with $1,000 “signing bonuses” and stipends for officers who work patrol. City officials angrily accused the union of violating the confidentiality of the talks, and Caraway issued a statement Saturday denying that he had made any “formal recommendation.”

The deal attributed to Caraway was far above the city’s last offer--a 6% pay raise over two years with a 2% bonus for patrol officers.

On Sunday, union leaders said they may call for an investigation of Riordan by the state attorney general’s office because of a telephone call he made to Caraway over the weekend. The union accused the mayor of putting “tremendous personal pressure” on Caraway to rescind his “recommendation,” which the union said is “tantamount to jury tampering.”

Before agreeing to declare an impasse, city officials considered the likelihood that such a decision might prompt more angry protests from officers. Officers have threatened a job action during the World Cup soccer tournament, which begins here Saturday, to embarrass the city in the eyes of the international media. But in the end, city officials decided that the talks ought to come to an end.

In the last few weeks, officers have angrily interrupted a speech by Riordan, staged a mass sickout and threatened to publicize embarrassing information on city leaders to pressure them into a deal.

In a confidential memo obtained by The Times, the city attorney’s office sharply criticized the union’s threats to disseminate personal information. Senior Assistant City Atty. Frederick N. Merkin said the threats alone may have violated several laws.

“The attempted intimidation of elected government officials puts in jeopardy their civil rights and places at risk the integrity of representative government,’ Merkin wrote to council members.

He made three recommendations to city leaders: Demand an apology from the union, pursue civil litigation or refer the matter for criminal prosecution to the district attorney’s office or the U. S. attorney’s office.

At Riordan’s news conference Monday, the mayor denied that he improperly tried to twist the mediator’s arm and said it is the union that has engaged in “a sustained pattern of irresponsible public statements.”

While condemning the union’s tactics, Riordan and other city officials took pains to praise the Police Department. But officials said fiscal constraints make it impossible to give LAPD officers everything they want.

“We want to work with them and we want to give them a raise . . . but they have to understand that there is more than just the Police Department to running the city,” council President John Ferraro said.

“I’m sure that police officers who have families want the recreational facilities for their children to play and want the libraries for their children to use,” Ferraro said. “There are a lot of things the city must provide.”

The city had come close to declaring an impasse last week, even preparing an official statement for Riordan to read at a news conference. But at the last minute, the union agreed to the city’s request to bring in an outside mediator. That process lasted several days before Monday’s breakdown.