Residents Agree With Riordan on Key Issues

Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan is in sync with Angelenos on most of today’s front-burner issues, and residents tend to consider him decisive and a strong leader, even though they give him less than sterling marks on his job performance and his role in improving race relations, the Los Angeles Times Poll has found.

Among the key issues on which city residents agree with Riordan are his pushes to expand the Police Department without raising taxes, his opposition to the secession of the San Fernando Valley and his support for a breakup of the Los Angeles Unified School District.

With 10 months to go before voters decide whether Riordan deserves a second term, 46% of Angelenos approve of the way he is handling his job, compared with 30% who do not and 24% who haven’t made up their minds. Among registered voters, his rating is significantly higher: 55% say they like his approach.

Those marks are virtually unchanged from a year ago, indicating that while Riordan has not gained ground during the past 12 months, he at least has stopped losing it. From June 1994, as he neared his first anniversary in office, to June 1995, as he approached the midpoint of his term, Riordan’s job rating dropped 13 percentage points with residents overall, and the erosion extended into his strong San Fernando Valley political base.

Riordan’s overall job approval rating is still below the 56% garnered by Police Chief Willie L. Williams but remains better than the dismal marks residents give the City Council--34% approval.

The poll, conducted under the supervision of acting Director Susan Pinkus from last Sunday through Tuesday, consisted of telephone interviews with 942 adults citywide. It has a margin of sampling error of 3.5 percentage points in either direction.

Riordan appears to be sitting pretty when it comes to key issues--a majority of residents agree with him that the city needs more police officers (71%) but that residents should not have to pay higher taxes to get them (55%). They agree with Riordan, 51% to 32%, that the sprawling school district should be dismantled to create smaller districts, and they share his opposition, 43% to 37%, to a Valley secession from the city.

Residents also seem to agree with Riordan’s top priorities--improving public safety and turning around the economy. Sixty-seven percent said crime is the biggest problem facing Los Angeles today, while nearly 1 in 5 said it is the economy. Others mentioned social issues (16%) and the city’s crumbling infrastructure (14%) as their top concerns.

By a 57% to 36% margin, residents believe Riordan has improved the city’s image. Residents also tend to see Riordan as a strong, decisive leader: 53% said he is decisive, contrasted with the 29% who did not. In addition, 50% view him as a strong leader, while 33% do not, a rating that has improved since a year ago, when 39% considered him a strong leader and 38% did not.

But Riordan’s relatively lackluster job approval rating should be of some concern to the mayor, Pinkus said.

“There are some underlying factors which could cause him problems, such as the perception that L.A. is a racially divided city and suffering from a slow economy,” Pinkus said. “In politics, perception is everything, and if Riordan cannot convince the city that he is bringing in jobs or trying to mend the city racially, he will have a long road ahead of him in next year’s mayoral race.”

She contrasted Riordan’s rating with the 55% approval enjoyed by President Clinton, who is well ahead in the polls for the November election. Nationally, people are optimistic about the economy and that is helping Clinton, Pinkus said, while local residents showed less confidence in the economy. Also telling, she said, is the relatively high number of residents who have not decided how they feel about Riordan--24%, compared with 5% for Clinton.

Riordan’s job approval rating is fed in part by residents’ generally pessimistic view of life in the city. Fifty-two percent said things are going badly for the city, and 39% believe things have gotten worse in their community during the past five years. While crime has dropped, residents do not seem to recognize that, with 61% saying they have seen no difference in the past year. Although economists agree that thousands of jobs have been added over the past couple years, only 41% of residents say the mayor has done a good job of bringing jobs and boosting economic opportunities; 50% said he has not done well in that area.

In addition, 48% believe that the wealthy, white Republican mayor from the Westside has done a poor job of improving race relations in the heavily minority, multiethnic city, while 43% say he has done a good job. In addition, 43% believe Riordan does not reach out equally to all people in the city, while 41% believe he does and 16% don’t know. Various groups vary widely in their perception of Riordan as an equal opportunity mayor. Thirty percent of whites think he reaches out only to some people, while among blacks the amount rises to 49%. It climbs even higher, to 55%, among Latinos, a group with which Riordan has generally fared relatively well.

“I don’t believe he’s interested in serving different types of people. I feel he’s a typical good old boy who would be serving the Republicans and the people with money and connections . . . his networking people,” was the harsh assessment offered by paralegal Nancy Chevrier, 38, a white resident of the San Fernando Valley, in a follow-up interview.

Tom Bradley, whose historic tenure as the city’s first black mayor stretched over two decades, enjoyed strong support across all major racial groups. His job approval ratings ranged from 74% in 1985, the first year The Times Poll surveyed residents on the matter, to 38% in May 1992, when his administration had been marred by political scandals, the beating of Rodney G. King in 1991 and the racially tinged riots that followed.

When asked if they would reelect Riordan, 50% of voters said yes. When matched against the two men most frequently mentioned as possible challengers, however, the mayor does very well: voters said they would choose him over Rep. Howard Berman (D-Panorama City) by 61% to 23% and over Sen. Tom Hayden (D-Santa Monica) by 59% to 30%.

In a hypothetical, seven-way matchup with local political figures sometimes mentioned as potential candidates for mayor, Riordan came out on top with support from 38%. His closest competitors were Supervisor Gloria Molina with 13% and Hayden with 12%. Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky got 7%, while Councilman Mark Ridley-Thomas pulled 5% and Councilwoman Laura Chick received 3%, tying for last place with Berman.

Residents’ views on adding police officers to the LAPD--and their willingness to pay for them--may say something about the prospects for a City Council-sponsored proposal to scale back the size of the Police Department expansion from the 710 that Riordan had wanted over the next year to 450. If voters agree to pay higher taxes in a still-to-be-crafted measure for the November ballot, the council would return the expansion pace to the higher number.

The move to scale back the police expansion, taken during just-completed deliberations on the coming fiscal year’s $4-billion budget, infuriated Riordan. He has made adding 2,800 officers over four years the centerpiece of his administration, and he has promised to do so without raising taxes. A majority of council members, however, said the city could not in the long run afford such an ambitious expansion without sacrificing jobs and services in parks, libraries and other important amenities.

While 71% of residents said they wanted more police, they showed no consensus on just how many more. Nor was there much enthusiasm for a tax hike to pay for the expansion; 55% said no to a tax, while 36% said they would pay.

“I think people all over California are paying enough taxes already,” said Isabel Martinez, 45, a housekeeper who lives in the Hollywood area. In a follow-up interview, the poll respondent said city officials “should find another way to pay for” the added officers.

Another poll respondent, Louis Perez, a 61-year-old sales representative who lives in Westchester, said he would pay more, albeit reluctantly.

“I don’t like the idea of having to pay a higher tax, but I think it’s important that we get to the full size,” Perez said. “So if that’s the only way we are going to be able to do it, then that’s the way it has to be.”

But respondent Sheila Rideaux Tagger, 32, who lives in South Los Angeles, said the city needs a lot more officers but doesn’t see how people can afford to tax themselves any more.

“I believe they could find another way,” said Tagger, a playground worker for an after-school program.

City residents overwhelmingly support the controversial measure on the November state ballot that would prohibit consideration of race or gender in hiring, college admissions and contracting practices. Sixty-nine percent of residents favor the anti-affirmative action initiative, known to supporters as the “California civil rights initiative,” while 22% oppose it. That is pretty much in line with the views held by Californians as a whole.

Among the city’s white residents, 73% approved of the initiative. Fifty-six percent of the city’s African Americans supported it, along with 68% of Latino residents; liberals and Democrats favor it, as do conservatives and Republicans.

Riordan has taken a lot of heat, particularly from minorities and liberals on the council, for refusing to take a position publicly on the measure; he says to do so would be divisive and unseemly for a leader who is supposed to represent all the people in the city.

Times staff writer Miles Corwin contributed to this report.

SATURDAY: The Times Poll examines Los Angeles residents’ views of the Los Angeles Police Department and its chief, Willie L. Williams.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Riordan’s Report Card

The good news for Mayor Richard Riordan: He receives high marks as a strong, decisive leader who has improved the city’s image. The bad news: He is perceived as not bringing jobs and economic opportunities to the city and not improving race relations.

Among all city residents, the mayor’s job rating has held steady over the last year, after a surge two years ago . . .

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JUNE ’96 JUNE ’95 JUNE ’94 OCT. ’93 Approve 46% 46% 59% 45% Disapprove 30% 28% 24% 17% Don’t Know 24% 26% 17% 38%

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. . . but the current level of approval varies widely by area and by ethnic group.

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WESTSIDE S.F. VALLEY CENTRAL SOUTH Approve 60% 47% 44% 37% Disapprove 24% 34% 27% 33% Don’t Know 16% 19% 29% 30%

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****

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WHITE BLACK LATINO Approve 60% 30% 34% Disapprove 24% 46% 33% Don’t Know 16% 24% 33%

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****

Citywide, many consider Riordan a decisive and strong leader . . .

Strong: 50%

Not Strong: 33%

Decisive: 53%

Not Decisive: 29%

****

. . . yet he gets mixed reviews on his job performance.

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GOOD JOB NOT SO GOOD On expanding the LAPD 50% 41% On improving L.A.’s image 57% 36% On bringing jobs to city 41% 50% On improving race relations 43% 48%

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NOTE: Numbers do not add to 100% where not all answer categories are shown.

Source: Los Angeles Times Poll

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How the Poll Was Conducted

The Times Poll contacted 942 adults citywide by telephone Saturday through Tuesday. Telephone numbers were chosen from a list of all exchanges in the city of Los Angeles. Interviewing was conducted in both English and Spanish. Random-digit dialing techniques were used so that listed and non-listed numbers could be contacted. The sample was weighted slightly to conform with census figures for sex, race, age, education and region. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points citywide; for certain subgroups the error margin may be somewhat higher. Poll results can also be affected by other factors such as question wording and the order in which questions are presented.