City Council Members Back LAPD Official : Police: Politicians support Assistant Chief Parks’ efforts to diversify department. Union has been critical of his approach.

City Council members voiced their support for the Los Angeles Police Department’s second-highest ranking officer Friday, joining a fractious debate that has divided the city’s police ranks along racial lines and prompted some minority officers to attack their own union.

Speaking at a news conference, a group of council members criticized the Los Angeles Police Protective League for filing a labor action against Assistant Chief Bernard C. Parks, one of the department’s best known and most respected officers.

The league has formed a special committee to investigate complaints by its members against Parks and has accused him of tampering with promotions in the LAPD’s Narcotics Group in order to boost the number of women and minorities who work for that unit.

Parks has aggressively sought to increase minority representation at the LAPD and canceled a recent set of promotions in the narcotics unit, but he has said he took that action because the testing procedures were improper.

The league’s move against Parks has sparked a heated debate within the Police Department, and council members Friday joined with minority officers who have risen to the assistant chief’s defense.

“This action on the part of the league is an affront to goals established by both the courts and the council,” said Councilwoman Rita Walters, who was accompanied by four other council members and a representative of a fifth. “I want to also express real concern that the league’s accusations will create further dissension within the ranks of the LAPD at a time we are seeking to increase the numbers of women and minorities.”

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Councilman Mark Ridley-Thomas, a member of the council’s Public Safety Committee, agreed. “We must support the efforts of Chief Parks and others who are fighting for basic fairness, diversity and the proper administration of promotional exams.”

Parks declined to comment on the issue in detail Friday, saying only: “I’m very appreciative of the council’s support of the department’s efforts.”

League officials attended the news conference and afterward accused council members of misrepresenting the dispute. The real argument, according to league general counsel Hank Hernandez, is not over minority representation at the LAPD, but over Parks’ handling of the narcotics promotions.

Hernandez stressed that union officials were not arguing against the principle that women and minorities should be better represented in the department ranks. In fact, Hernandez said, the union has long been a champion of minority officers seeking to improve the LAPD.

“It is not the league that is dividing the department along racial lines,” Hernandez said. “It is people like Chief Parks.”

Hernandez called on the City Council to conduct an investigation of the recent narcotics promotions and asked Mayor Richard Riordan to get involved in the process as well.

In criticizing Parks, one league official this week said he feared that the assistant chief was preparing to launch a program of “ethnic cleansing,” a remark that deeply angered Parks as well as the lawmakers who appeared at Friday’s news conference.

“The response (from the council members) comes to items like calling this ethnic cleansing,” said Councilwoman Jackie Goldberg. “Regardless of whether an error was or was not made in a particular case, that’s an outrageous remark.”

Although they did not address that specific comment, league officials used milder rhetoric during their news conference. They said they were not trying to launch a personal attack on Parks, and Hernandez at one point said league officials wanted to “extend a hand of cooperation” to the assistant chief.

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Meanwhile, however, leaders of the Oscar Joel Bryant Foundation, the largest African American police officers association, said the league’s actions demonstrated the union’s determination to represent the interests of white male members over those of female and minority members.

“If this is the best that the Protective League can do for its minority members, then it is time for minority members to pull out of the Protective League and represent ourselves,” Leonard Ross, president of the 600-member foundation, said in a press release.

Lt. Otis Dobine, president of the Assn. of Black Law Enforcement Executives, echoed that view, accusing the league of failing to represent its female and minority members and calling on union leaders to halt their criticism of Parks.

“All the chief is doing is saying: ‘Let’s do this right. Let’s make this fair,’ ” said Dobine, who is in charge of detectives at the LAPD’s Pacific division. “He has the courage and the strength to do what’s fair.”

The Narcotics Group promotions have been put on hold because of the controversy, and department officials said Chief Willie L. Williams has postponed new oral exams that had been slated for next week.

The issue is likely to flare up again Tuesday, when narcotics detectives expect to appear before the Los Angeles Police Commission to lodge complaints against Parks. His backers also plan to appear before the panel.