Alarcon’s Choice of Candidate to Succeed Him Remains a Mystery

Who will state Sen. Richard Alarcon endorse to fill the 7th District City Council seat he vacated this month? Ask three people and get three answers.

Many people agree that Alarcon’s endorsement is important in the race for the northeast San Fernando Valley seat, and whoever gets it could become the new front-runner, now that Alarcon’s wife, Corina, has dropped out of the race.

The day that his wife withdrew, Alarcon said he would endorse either former San Fernando Mayor Raul Godinez II, social service agency director Corinne Sanchez or legislative aide Alejandro Padilla.

Godinez and Sanchez said they were not concerned to hear talk from some political activists in the northeast Valley that Corina Alarcon had dropped out of the race as part of a deal between Richard Alarcon and Assemblyman Tony Cardenas (D-Sylmar), in which the Alarcons would endorse Padilla, Cardenas’ aide.

Richard Alarcon, however, denied in an interview with The Times that such a deal was made. He offered similar assurances to Sanchez when she met with him Tuesday night.

Sanchez believes there is no such deal.

“I had heard the rumor and I asked him about it,” Sanchez said. “He indicated it’s not so. He’s leaning toward Godinez or myself. He feels Alex is not experienced enough.”

But Padilla, 25, said he believes he has a good chance of securing Alarcon’s endorsement, pointing out that he ran Alarcon’s campaign for the state Senate.

“I would love to have his endorsement,” Padilla said, noting he already has the endorsement of Cardenas.

Godinez, 36, has also met with Alarcon in hopes of getting his backing.

Alarcon is asking the candidates how they would carry on his work to improve the northeastern Valley and how prepared they are to run a strong campaign.

Sanchez, a 51-year-old attorney who is president of a health-care charity, El Proyecto Del Barrio, said Alarcon was impressed when she told him she would have raised $30,000 for the campaign by today.

Alarcon said Padilla, Sanchez and Godinez are all friends and all would make good candidates.

“I will be looking for the candidate who will best be able to finish the projects I’ve initiated,” Alarcon said.

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FOX STEPPING DOWN: After 12 years of serving as leader of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn., Joel Fox is stepping down next week as the group’s president.

Fox’s signature on a ballot argument against any city bond measure could sway voters against it, while his support sometimes gave city officials credibility when they argued that funds were desperately needed.

“His imprimatur on a bond measure was very important and really sent the signal that everyone was on board,” Los Angeles City Councilman Mike Feuer said. “Clearly, he and the organization he represented for so long stood for fiscal conservatism.”

Fox, a Granada Hills resident who was active in Los Angeles civic affairs, is being replaced as president by John Coupal, who will work out of Sacramento.

Fox plans to remain in the Valley, which was the birthplace of the tax-revolt movement founded in the 1970s by Howard Jarvis and Paul Gann. Jarvis and Gann were behind voters’ approval in 1978 of Proposition 13, which slashed property taxes. Fox took over the influential taxpayers’ group after Jarvis’ death.

“After my husband’s passing, Joel Fox was exactly the right man for the job,” said Estelle Jarvis, an association board member. “He has ably protected and built on Howard’s achievements.”

Fox said he requested the change to allow him more time for writing and consulting work.

He still plans, however, to speak out on issues involving the use of taxpayer money in his home city of Los Angeles.

“I’ll be around,” he said.

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SHERMAN’S RESEARCH: Rep. Brad Sherman had no direct role to play in the committee work that led to the impeachment of President Clinton. But as he showed recently, the Harvard alum is a pretty fastidious researcher--and that is coming in handy for his fellow Democrats.

During the height of this month’s impeachment hearings, Sherman (D-Sherman Oaks) dug up a 1975 Georgetown Law Journal piece that explained why the House Judiciary Committee voted down an article of impeachment against President Richard Nixon that stemmed from his false 1969 tax return.

Written by former Democratic Rep. Edward Mezvinsky, who introduced the impeachment article in question a year before, the piece concluded that the article was defeated mainly because committee members did not consider Nixon’s lie an impeachable offense.

Some present-day Republicans looking to nail Clinton were arguing the cause involved lack of evidence, and there was apparently little said about the tax perjury article at the 1974 impeachment hearings to clear up matters.

Sherman learned about the piece after he called Mezvinsky, and quickly sent a letter to fellow House members. It was soon being quoted by a variety of Democratic colleagues.

Sherman’s missive also mentioned a memo that is part of the public record on the 1974 hearings. That memo describes the views of some Republican Judiciary Committee members in 1974: “Framers of the United States Constitution intended that the President should be removable by the legislative branch only for serious misconduct dangerous to the system of government.”

That was the minority opinion expressed back then by some GOP members--including Trent Lott, the current Senate majority leader.

Of course, the fresh ammunition uncovered by Sherman was not enough to stem the House’s frantic push for impeachment, and Republicans continue to insist the Nixon tax fraud was not considered impeachable because it was unproven.

But hoping to push the case for censure instead of impeachment for Clinton in the coming Senate trial, Sherman recently sent a version of his letter to his counterparts in the upper house.

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MAYOR’S MESSAGE: Mayor Richard Riordan often complains he lacks power, but sometimes he uses the bully pulpit of his office to great effect.

That appears to have been the case Dec. 2 when the mayor put a special message on all city paychecks.

“Make your holiday purchases in L.A.,” the message stated.

Among those who got the message were police officers in the LAPD’s Pacific Division, who two weeks later were issued gasoline credit cards to fuel up their patrol cars when the fuel tanks at their police station were closed for retrofitting.

The problem: The credit cards were good only for gas stations in Culver City, near the police station but outside the Los Angeles city limits.

“Some of the police officers thought that wasn’t right,” recalled Lt. Raymond Foster. “It just makes sense to have the money go to the local merchants. This is our community.”

So, faced with protests by the rank and file, the motor transport managers at Parker Center switched the credit cards for others good at stations in Los Angeles.

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TRACK VS. TRAIL: Los Angeles City Councilman Hal Bernson rode to the rescue of a phalanx of distraught hikers and equestrians this week, winning a temporary concession from the regional transit agency whose board he sits on.

The brouhaha began shortly before Christmas, when the Southern California Regional Rail Authority, which runs the Metrolink commuter trains, erected a fence along the railroad tracks at the end of Andora Avenue in Chatsworth. The fence blocked access to a system of horse trails on both sides of the tracks, bringing complaints from residents of the northwestern Valley that Bernson represents.

“I would say there’s really quite a lot of concern,” said Jean Plumb, Bernson’s equestrian advisor. “Several hundred concerned riders, hikers and homeowners have written letters.”

Plumb took the matter to David Solow, the rail authority’s interim director, who agreed to leave a gate near the crossing open until he could study the area further in early January.

The standoff between train and trail began after officials from a nearby school asked rail officials to put up a fence to keep children from straying onto the tracks, Solow said. When workers went to install the fence, they noted the horse crossing--situated near a train tunnel and a curve--as a potential danger.

“I’m obviously sensitive to the fact that there’s been historically an unofficial crossing here,” Solow said. “But I also have to be concerned about the safety. . . . We’re in a no-win situation.”

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McGreevy and Bustillo are Times staff writers. Fox is a correspondent.