TV Debate Likely to Be Only Face-Off in Race for Mayor

A 30-minute debate broadcast live on a small Westside cable station this morning will likely be the only time the candidates for mayor of Los Angeles confront each other during this campaign season.

But it’s not for lack of trying.

State Sen. Tom Hayden (D-Los Angeles) has called on incumbent Mayor Richard Riordan to debate at least four times, in various parts of the sprawling city, before the April 8 election. But Riordan has refused. The mayor has declined debate invitations from universities, media outlets and community organizations, and has also been a no-show at numerous candidate forums.

“I said we can do anything. He can come in after Hayden leaves--whatever. Just give me a date. They kept postponing,” said Oscar Labatto, president of the Latin Business Assn., which hosted Hayden solo last week. “Finally, I called my contact at City Hall, and he said the mayor ‘doesn’t want to be on the same stage as Hayden.’ So I gave up.”

Wednesday, Hayden was the lone candidate at a “mayoral forum” at Cal State L.A. The mayor was absent, though his campaign press secretary sat in the audience taking notes.

“Why is Riordan ignoring our questions?” the campus newspaper asked in an editorial. “He was anxiously courted to participate, but in the end, bailed.”

Riordan, a lawyer and businessman more comfortable in private negotiations than public political combat, is trying to avoid direct confrontation with Hayden, who has spent his entire adult life on various public stages, and was widely perceived to have won a 1994 debate among the Democratic gubernatorial candidates.

“The rule here is: The less contact the better,” one Riordan campaign aide confided.

“He’s extremely busy being mayor, doing what the people elected him to do,” campaign manager Julio Ramirez said.

On Wednesday, Riordan accepted an invitation for an April 3 event at the Sacred Heart Church in Lincoln Heights. But it’s not exactly a debate.

“That would be a misnomer,” said Gary Smith of the San Fernando Valley group VOICE, which is co-sponsoring the event with the Latino United Neighborhood Organization and the Southern California Organizing Committee. “His staff doesn’t want him to be on the stage at the same time [as Hayden]. We’re going to ask them the same questions, but it won’t be a debate.”

Formally, Riordan still is weighing whether to agree to a debate in the San Fernando Valley, his major political base, co-sponsored by Cal State Northridge and the Los Angeles Daily News. But sources say he plans to decline. He has never responded to an invitation from the League of Women Voters, which offered to organize a meeting any time, anywhere.

“I couldn’t get him even to acknowledge that he got my fax. Talk about stonewalling,” the league’s Thea Brodkin said. “I guess I might advise him the same thing if I were running his campaign, but it’s really bad for the voters.”

Riordan, a heavy favorite for reelection, is not required to debate because he is not accepting public matching funds to finance his campaign. But observers say he agreed to today’s showdown on Century Cable because of his friendship with host Bill Rosendahl--and to avoid accusations that he would not confront his opponent.

During his first political campaign in 1993, Riordan and his opponent, former City Councilman Mike Woo, debated six times between the April primary and the June runoff. The final two debates were on live television the two nights before election day.

Since last Friday, the mayor and his campaign team have been preparing for today’s debate with Hayden under the direction of opposition research coordinator Ace Smith. There have been at least five practice sessions. Ramirez and Noelia Rodriguez, the campaign’s communications director, prepared questions for the mayor to consider, and Ben Sherwood--a writer who worked on Kathleen Brown’s 1994 gubernatorial campaign--was tapped to play the role of Hayden.

Sherwood declined to comment, but a source close to Riordan said the first rehearsal left the mayor fuming at his own performance. That same source said Riordan has steadily improved with each practice round, becoming more confident and focused.

“He knows all the stuff,” the source said. “It’s a matter of pulling the messages into 45-second answers.”

“He’s been comfortable,” Ramirez agreed. “He’s doing well. He’s ready.”

A nimble debater who is as handy with a biting quip as a persuasive metaphor, Hayden has apparently spent less time rehearsing for today’s event, though he has been honing his one-liners during numerous meetings with small groups of voters.

On Wednesday, the student activist-turned-legislator scheduled just one public appearance so he could prepare for the debate. After a Valley residents meeting Tuesday evening, Hayden returned to his Mandeville Canyon home to brainstorm potential questions with his wife, actress Barbara Williams, campaign consultant Larry Remer and press secretary Rocky Rushing.

“He has been more or less cloistered today to prepare for it,” Rushing said. “I don’t know exactly what he’s doing.”

Hayden and Remer said there would be no formal rehearsal.

Though Rosendahl’s show will be broadcast later this afternoon on KCAL-TV Channel 9 and repeated on the Los Angeles school district’s cable channel, Hayden lamented the lack of additional opportunities to engage his opponent.

“Shouldn’t the great city of Los Angeles be treated to the experience of a democratic debate about our future for more than 25 minutes?” he asked. “If you think you’re successful in campaigning by staying removed, then that’s how you’ll run the city. It may be an effective campaign tactic, but it’s an insult to the city.”

Stephen J. Cohen, news director of UPN-TV Channel 13, said Riordan’s rejection of three different formats proposed by his station “leaves the public way behind.”

“I think it’s upsetting that the incumbent with the power doesn’t feel he can risk a few appearances on television and let Hayden have at him,” Cohen said.