Mayor’s Move in LAPD Matter Is Debated

This week’s decision on Los Angeles Police Chief Willie L. Williams was the best thing that could have happened to state Sen. Tom Hayden’s longshot mayoral campaign.

But Mayor Richard Riordan’s swift suggestion that Deputy Chief Bernard Parks fill the chief’s shoes--at least temporarily--was the worst.

“That was a shrewd move politically, because that will blunt some of the criticism from the African American community,” said Kerman Maddox, a political science instructor at L.A.’s community colleges and a host of “Life and Times,” a public affairs program. “It takes a lot of the sting out of what Tom Hayden thought he could use to his political advantage.”

Maddox and other black leaders--some of whom endorsed Riordan in November, before Hayden (D-Los Angeles) even announced his candidacy--said they believe African American voters who are angry over the decision not to rehire Williams are more likely to stay home April 8 than flock to Hayden.

And although Williams is also popular among liberals on the Westside and in the San Fernando Valley, observers do not believe voters there would choose the chief over the mayor.

“Willie’s popularity is a mile wide and an inch deep. I don’t think this is the kind of thing that causes massive defection from Riordan; some may disagree with Riordan, but nobody will be able to say this is an outrageous decision,” said county Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky. “It would take a bolt of lightning and a biblical miracle for this [mayor’s race] to turn around at this point.”

Still, Hayden--who long ago endorsed Williams for a second term--says the decision is emblematic of Riordan’s behind-the-scenes attempt to consolidate his power. The state senator’s political strategist, Larry Remer, said nothing better “epitomizes the differences between” the two candidates, adding that the issue “benefits us tremendously.”

And Hayden, whose Crenshaw district campaign office is decorated with a sign that declares “Keep Willie Williams--Hayden for Mayor,” says he is asked about the popular chief everywhere he goes--leafleting in Latino Highland Park, at Sunday services at Williams’ church, and at house parties this weekend in Brentwood, Mt. Washington and Venice.

“Willie Williams stands tall in L.A. There’s no one who’s better at bringing people together,” Hayden said at a weekend gathering of artists sipping sparkling water and chardonnay, repeating his oft-told story of being impressed with the chief’s performances at the North Hollywood shootout and in public forums.

“There’s no worse or nastier issue than the mayor trying to get rid of this police chief,” Hayden said. “It’s not even about police. Why won’t this guy be man enough to come out and give his reasons? With that, the people in South-Central think they’re trying to get rid of him because he’s black.”

In trying to help people connect the dots between Williams and the mayor, Hayden may get some help from elected officials and other African American religious and political leaders in South Los Angeles.

At a meeting this morning at the Boulevard Cafe, about a dozen black opinion-makers will plot strategy on what to do next. With the prospects for getting 10 of the 15 members of the City Council to vote to overturn the commission decision dubious at best, state Sen. Diane Watson (D-Los Angeles)--who backs Hayden for mayor--is hoping to at least get some prominent blacks to withdraw their support of Riordan.

“Where do we go from here? We need to speak out as a community,” Watson said Tuesday. “If decisions can be made like that without questions, then we’re just rubber-stampers. I don’t think our community can stand by and let Richard Riordan make decisions for us. We need to stand up.”

Urban League President John Mack, one of 30 black leaders to sign on early to Riordan’s reelection effort, said he and several others have requested a meeting with the mayor, after which they will reevaluate their endorsement.

But civil rights activists Joe Hicks and Martha Brown Hicks, and elected officials, including Rep. Julian Dixon (D-Los Angeles), county Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke, Los Angeles school board member Barbara Boudreaux, state Sen. Teresa Hughes (D-Inglewood) and Assemblyman Kevin Murray(D-Los Angeles)--many of whom are also strong backers of Williams--all said this week they are sticking with Riordan.

“Once I endorse a person, unless there was something terribly wrong with the relationship, I would never pull it,” Boudreaux said, nevertheless predicting that the mayor will suffer among her constituents.

“We have lost many African American voters through this Willie Williams upset,” she said. “People are very concerned about the way he was derailed. I’m very disappointed about how the mayor has his hands and his fingerprints all over the Willie Williams decision.”

The mayor has consistently tried to distance himself from the decision-making process on the chief’s bid for a second five-year term, saying the Police Commission he appointed was evaluating Williams independently.

On Monday, he also vowed to keep the issue out of the mayor’s race: “I have not put this in the context of the reelection campaign,” Riordan said during his televised news conference. “I would hope that my opponent would not politicize it either.”

But many activists and analysts said the mayor’s simultaneous endorsement of Parks--another prominent African American officer with deep ties in South-Central--to be the interim chief smacked of political maneuvering.

“The Parks move may well neutralize a lot of people, which is probably a part of the calculation,” said Hicks, executive director of the nonprofit Multicultural Collaborative. “The people who are Tom Hayden supporters are going to yell foul and say dirty pool, but in politics I guess that’s just the way the game is played.”

Even if African American and other minority voters are convinced that a vote for Hayden is a way to voice their support for the chief, a reality check shows that will probably not be enough to affect the outcome of the election.

Although whites no longer constitute a majority of the residents of Los Angeles, they remain the most consistent voters in the nation’s second-largest city. Experts expect less than 10% of the votes in the mayoral election to be cast by blacks, another 10% or so by Latinos.

Williams’ status as the city’s most popular elected official, however, extends across racial and neighborhood boundaries. A Times Poll published last month showed that 55% of residents citywide believed Williams deserved a second five-year term, and 66% approved of his job performance; that is higher than Riordan’s rating has ever been.

Still, two-thirds of the respondents to the same poll said their mayoral votes would not be swayed by the candidates positions on Riordan.

“It’s a much deeper issue than who wins the mayor’s race that was at stake” in the Williams decision, said City Councilman Mike Feuer, whose district straddles the Westside and Valley and brings a huge chunk of voters to every election. “This decision is not about who should be mayor of Los Angeles. This decision is about the future of safety on Los Angeles streets.”

Claremont Graduate School political scientist Sherry Bebitch Jeffe and Larry Levine, a Democratic political consultant based in the Valley, said white liberals generally like Williams, but bring broader concerns to the ballot box.

“I don’t think there’s a sense that the mayor was the heavy hand in all of this. The support is not only of the chief, but it is also of the department, and the message from the department is: We go on. That resonates in the Valley,” Jeffe said. “I just don’t see [Williams] being the No. 1 priority. Yes they support him, but it’s not a cutting issue.”

For Levine, the real problem is Hayden, whom he sees as vulnerable on issues of public safety.

“The mayor, politically, was in a prime position to do what he wants to do because he has no opposition that can take advantage of this issue,” he said. “Those people who feel strongly about public safety have no confidence in Tom. Those people whose confidence in the mayor may have been shaken by this are left with no place to go.”