Riordan Fuels Debate Over Role of Mayor and Council

Ever since the current city government was created under a 1925 charter, Los Angeles mayors have complained about a structure that gives the lion’s share of power to the 15-member City Council.

From Fletcher Bowron in 1939 to Sam Yorty in 1969, past mayors have sought more authority, saying the work of government is too often bogged down in parochial disputes among council members.

Mayor Richard Riordan is no different--with one notable exception: He has vowed to put as much as $400,000 of his personal wealth into trying to shift power to the mayor’s office.

In an unprecedented move, Riordan--the venture capitalist whose fortune is estimated at $100 million--is underwriting a petition drive to create an elected citizens panel that would rewrite the 71-year-old City Charter.

In addition, Riordan aides say the mayor plans to bankroll a slate of candidates for the panel and may tap business associates to fund the panel’s two to three years of studies.

Riordan’s petition drive has ignited a debate in and out of City Hall on the role of the mayor and the council.

His supporters say Riordan’s motives are pure, that reform is sorely needed and that a more powerful mayor is necessary because the council spends most of its time fighting petty jurisdictional disputes.

Critics say the mayor is using his considerable fortune to buy personal political power and in the process subordinate an unfriendly council. They say a wealthy mayor using his money to get his way raises serious questions.

“It has the same awkwardness that all interventions of money in politics have, which is that, when you have money, you have a louder voice,” said Mark Moore, a professor of public policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

UCLA political scientist Xandra Kayden, who has been critical of Riordan’s efforts, is more blunt: “If he can’t rule by consensus, is this another way he may rule?”

Riordan rejects criticism that the effort is a veiled power grab. Instead, he describes it as an attempt to clarify the lines of authority in City Hall so that voters can hold one city leader accountable for administrative duties.

“Government by committee has never worked, in business or in the public sector,” Riordan said recently. “In this case, the committee is 15 council members.”

He has repeatedly noted that even if the panel’s reform proposals are adopted by voters sometime in the next three years, he can only benefit from the changes at the tail end of a second term.

“What should I be using my money for, buying yachts or jets?” he said.

Although most council members and political scientists agree that the 1925 charter should be updated, many are uneasy or downright angry that Riordan’s money is playing such a major role in the effort.

“Every day he is trying to increase his power,” said Councilman Nate Holden. “He has taken his money and used it in the worst ways.”

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Says Raphael Sonenshein, Cal State Fullerton political science professor: “The notion of a mayor personally financing an initiative like this is totally new territory.”

Sonenshein, who has written about Los Angeles politics, worries that charges of a Riordan-financed power grab may taint a much-needed government reform campaign.

“Charter reform is delicate enough without one side trying to win over the other side,” he said.

Not all view Riordan’s efforts in a sinister light.

Councilwoman Jackie Goldberg has harshly criticized Riordan’s petition drive but says she doesn’t believe Riordan is motivated by a lust for power.

“I have found that the mayor very often feels that what he is doing is reform-based. Whether I feel it’s reform-based is another issue,” she said.

Nonetheless, Goldberg and other council members said they fear that Riordan may use his personal wealth in the future to fund another initiative drive when City Hall’s political process gets in his way.

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Others in City Hall say Riordan’s reform efforts are understandable considering how difficult it is for the City Council to lead when it is often mired in debates over how to distribute services, among other matters.

Councilman Marvin Braude, a 31-year council veteran who has seen several administrations come and go, said the council can be very divisive and too often wrangles over administrative matters that he said should be the purview of the mayor.

“The council is always in a predisposition to dominate local administrative matters and I think that still happens,” he said. “The major difference is that this is an active mayor, more active than previous mayors, and he is interested in change.”

The city was established with the mayor serving as the administrative head of the government and with the council empowered to create legislation and make policy.

But to ensure that one branch of government did not overpower another, the 1925 charter distributed power to various commissions and panels and required the mayor to get council approval to hire and fire department heads.

Kevin Starr, the state librarian for California, said the charter was designed to create various positions of power so that the ruling business class could run the city independently of elected officials.

He said the so-called oligarchy wanted to make sure that the city’s power base was always stable and not susceptible to changes brought about by elections.

“To reform the government today is to say that you trust the political process,” Starr said.

Because of the charter, power as practiced in the mayor’s office has often been a matter of personality.

For example, Sam Yorty had difficulty getting the council to support his legislative agenda and complained often that the charter diluted his authority. He supported two charter reform packages in 1970 and 1971, both of which called for increasing the mayor’s administrative power over city departments. Both initiatives were narrowly rejected by voters.

On the other hand, Mayor Tom Bradley, Yorty’s successor, worked closely with the council, in part because he was a former councilman who shared the viewpoints of many of its members.

He was known for building alliances on the council to get important legislation adopted, including a downtown redevelopment project and a rent control ordinance.

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Riordan has enjoyed less success with the council. Riordan, a Republican businessman who has tried to bring a corporate mentality to City Hall, has repeatedly clashed with the liberal majority of the council.

In 1992, the mayor’s powers were whittled further when voters approved Proposition 5, which allows the council to override decisions made by commissions that previously answered only to the mayor.

Several council members as well as Riordan allies say Riordan’s initiative drive is evidence of his impatience with the political process and his desire to make changes quickly.

“After three years in office, he has realized that he can’t fix City Hall with the old rusty tools that he has,” said David Fleming, an influential Studio City attorney who has teamed up with Riordan on the petition drive.

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To succeed, Riordan’s campaign needs the signatures of 197,000 registered voters by Oct. 31. To ensure that all the signatures are valid, the campaign aims to collect up to 300,000 of them.

Although Riordan has declined to say how much of the campaign he will fund, campaign supporters said the mayor has provided “up front” funding to launch the campaign and hopes to be reimbursed by private contributions.

Despite the rhetoric on both sides, a compromise was nearly reached as recently as last month. At that time, the council and the mayor were close to an agreement to create a reform panel--appointed by the council and other elected officials, including the mayor--with the power to put ideas directly on the ballot.

But by that time, Riordan had already launched his campaign and the council members rejected the compromise proposed by Councilmen Mike Feuer and John Ferraro, saying they resented the pressure put upon them by Riordan.

Instead, a council majority voted to create a 21-member appointed panel proposed by Councilwoman Ruth Galanter. Under Galanter’s plan, however, the council retains the power to rewrite or reject any reform measures before putting them on the ballot.

When the compromise was rejected, Riordan publicly criticized the council and vowed to continue with his campaign. Under his plan, the 15-member citizen panel would have the power to put its recommendations directly on the ballot without council approval.