Delegates Arrive in City Prepared for Best, Worst

Democrats, gathering forces for the presidential election struggle ahead, streamed into Los Angeles Saturday for their national convention and fanned out to sample the city, while police prepared for demonstrations and protesters made plans of their own.

Staples Center, the new sports arena turned into a convention hall, rumbled with the sound of power tools. At Los Angeles International Airport, hosts welcomed delegates with fortune cookies, all bearing the same message: “Your fortune begins in Los Angeles.”

A smattering of small demonstrations kept police alert, but there were no injuries or damage to property.

Away from those hubs of activity, life in the city hummed along as usual, albeit under the watchful eyes of a noticeably larger number of law enforcement officers. Children played soccer in the morning heat at a park in Temple Beaudry. Mourners assembled at St. James Episcopal Church to protest gun violence. Diners grabbed their usual seats at Farmers Market in mid-Wilshire.

Downtown was largely vacant but for police. Protesters met to lay plans. Late in the day, the Police Department ordered officers to 12-hour shifts, putting hundreds of additional police on the city’s streets--at a cost of $1.5 million a day.

Delegates streamed into town, arriving at Los Angeles International Airport in full regalia. Hotels in El Segundo, Santa Monica, Pasadena, Los Angeles and elsewhere filled with buoyant politicos, full of enthusiasm and optimism for the week. They were so thick at one hotel that mounted police units had to ask delegates to stop petting the horses.

“It’s just too much for them,” an officer said.

The week’s main players, Vice President Al Gore and his chosen running mate, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, were far away from the local stage Saturday. In Pennsylvania, a key state for both parties in the coming election, Gore highlighted his environmental record at a stop in Springdale, home of the late Rachel Carson, author of the landmark environmental book “Silent Spring.”

“A long time ago,” he said, “I committed myself to a new springtime filled with the sounds of wild birds, with the sounds of children learning about and appreciating the environment.”

Gore will accept his party’s nomination for the presidency on Thursday, the final night of a four-day event that Democrats hope will at least pull their candidate even in his race against Texas Gov. George W. Bush.

On Saturday, in the hall where Gore will make his acceptance speech, photographers set up their equipment and checked camera angles. As Secret Service agents guarded the podium, First Lady and New York Senate candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton made a brief appearance; she is scheduled to speak Monday night.

Delegates Settle In

At LAX, which just got a minor face lift, arriving delegates were greeted by host committee volunteers and, at the United Airlines concourse, passed a banner that read: “L.A. Convention 2000 Welcomes the Democratic National Convention to Los Angeles, the Capital City of the 21st Century.”

The delegates were easily distinguishable from other travelers, mainly by their buttons.

“Read My Lips,” one read. “No New Texans.”

“We are united as a party,” Wisconsin delegate Tom Kitchen said as he walked through the United Airlines terminal. The parochial-school teacher from Fond du Lac said he hopes the party emerges from the convention with “a good bounce [in the polls] and ready to do battle in the fall . . . We need an uplift here to take on the Republicans.”

In Hollywood, about 100 members of the Oklahoma delegation checked in and melted into the eclectic flow of Hollywood Boulevard.

There and across Southern California, delegate after delegate arrived bearing lists of things to do and see.

“I want to see Santa Monica. This is a working trip, but it’s a vacation trip, too,” said Melanie Miller, a delegate from Clinton, Md.

Miller, a sales manager for a beverage distribution company, said she plans to stick around after the convention for a few days: “I want to try some of the bike trails around here and rent some roller skates. What I really want to do is go to the ‘Price is Right’ show, but I can’t fit that in.”

Girding for Protest

Outside Staples Center, downtown Los Angeles was occupied by scores of police officers, mostly from the LAPD but supplemented with a visible contingent of the California Highway Patrol. The jewelry district, normally a bustling place on a Saturday morning, was all but vacant, as many owners passed up the chance to make a bundle off visiting delegates for fear of what might occur if protests got out of hand.

There were no serious incidents Saturday, but police were leaving nothing to chance. Parker Center, home of the LAPD, was ringed with concrete barricades. Police Chief Bernard C. Parks, local clergy, civil rights leaders and the head of the city’s human relations commission delivered a rare, joint address via videotape to the LAPD’s officers.

‘You’ve been well-trained,” Parks said on the tape. “You have the necessary equipment and I’m very confident in your ability. . . .”

“We realize our mission is to keep the city safe,” Parks said in an interview. “Our other mission, however, is not to allow other people to disrupt the event.”

Demonstrators were laying their own plans, gathering lists of bail bondsmen, studying maps of the city and distributing police misconduct forms in preparation for what they fear will be a police overreaction to their demonstrations.

“The energy right now is a simmering excitement,” said Peter Dorian, a University of Florida student.

At a lecture hall at Loyola Law School, just blocks from Staples Center, a half-dozen attorneys and legal observers, preparing to deal with arrests or other problems, received their first call before they even had a chance to break their morning bagels. It came from nearby First United Methodist Church, where a handful of activists had started unloading 553 wooden crosses for a display against the government’s crackdown on illegal immigrants. Each cross represented an immigrant who had died crossing into California through the desert, they said.

As they unloaded the crosses, more than 50 police officers in half as many squad cars converged on Flower Street out front and began questioning the protesters.

After a brief standoff, a police captain arrived, met with a lawyer for the demonstrators and agreed that there was no harm in the activity. About 10 a.m., an officer approached the demonstrators and politely told one: “We respect what you’re doing here.”

One demonstration Saturday afternoon did result in an arrest. While supporters stood on the sidewalk chanting “Meat is murder,” Sean Biener, a protester from Salt Lake City, drove a dump truck loaded with manure to the front of the Wilshire Grand Hotel on Figueroa Street and released its contents. He was immediately taken into custody by police, who said he would be booked on suspicion of felony vandalism.

Elsewhere, a few small demonstrations took place under the watchful eyes of police. All were peaceful.

Blacks Tentative on Gore

Gore, who expects to arrive in Los Angeles on Wednesday, and Lieberman, arriving Tuesday, hope to roll into the city riding a wave of enthusiasm for their ticket. On Saturday, there was plenty of that from delegates and others. But there were signs too of guardedness, particularly evident at a well-attended USC round table of leading black intellectuals and politicians.

Asked if blacks should vote for Gore, Jesse Jackson Jr. of Illinois twice resisted a direct response, then answered: “The only option is Al Gore. But if there was another campaign that was speaking to our issues that had the possibility and plausibility of winning, we should support that campaign.”

That tepid enthusiasm was widely reflected at the event--whose participants included Rep. Maxine Waters, the Rev. Al Sharpton, NAACP President Kweisi Mfume, National Urban League President Hugh B. Price and Harvard law professors Lani C. Guinier and Cornel West, among others.

Repeatedly, participants worried that what they see as the moderate progress for blacks experienced under President Clinton will not continue, even if Gore wins. Lieberman, several speakers noted, supports school vouchers and the expansion of prisons, and has denounced affirmative action.

“We have, in our vice presidential nominee, someone who is different from us on many of these issues,” Waters said, speaking as part of the round-table at USC.

“No one,” said Farai Chideya, an author and commentator, “is speaking to the traditional base of the Democratic Party.”

Mayor Golfs, Gives

Almost literally in the shadow of Staples Center, homeless people and advocates, who are staging their own convention, got a boost Saturday when Mayor Richard Riordan arranged the donation of a tent, 500 chairs, tables and a stage from Premier Party Rents. There is the possibility the city will also help with more in-kind donations, such as portable toilets and food, and possibly cash, organizers said.

Given all the politics in the air, homeless activist and convention organizer Ted Hayes called the mayor’s gesture “genuine.”

And he noted the absence of support from the other so-called progressives in town.

Riordan was miles away in more comfortable surroundings. The mayor was a last-minute addition to a golf foursome that included President Clinton.

As dozens of people watched, Clinton hit a powerful drive down the fairway. Riordan, who enjoys golf but whose real avocation is bicycling, was not so lucky.

“The mayor shanked one off to the right, then took a mulligan and hit the fence,” said Andrew T. Kugler, 27, a Venice lawyer, whose foursome waited while Clinton’s group played through.

A mulligan is taking a second shot instead of playing your first ball.

“You’re not supposed to do that,” Kugler said. “But he is the mayor.”

Life Goes On

For all the churning activity, many parts of Los Angeles glided through the day, barely touched by the hustle and bustle.

Adolf Dusil was in his regular Saturday spot at Farmers Market. Dusil, a Czechoslovakian immigrant, meets every Saturday and Wednesday with other immigrants to talk about their favorite subjects: politics and women.

“We prefer the ladies,” said Dusil, who is a supervisor at a local factory. “I’m disgusted with politics.”

Not so for the 30 men who gather regularly to play Chivo, a sort of Mexican craps, in an area of MacArthur Park marked by signs that say “No Gambling Allowed.” On Saturday, they grumbled about increased police patrols forcing them to stop their game every minute or so.

Inconvenience, however minor, was not limited to gambling in the park. Business was spotty across town. Some welcomed crowds, others bemoaned the lack of them. On Rodeo Drive, Louis Vitton bustled; Ermenegildo Zegna did not.

Kent Froehlich, a retired Beverly Hills attorney, went to Spago on Friday night for dinner. “It was roped off like a fortress,” he said.

For far different reasons, county health care workers found themselves put out Saturday by the convention. They were assigned to knock on doors in the Staples Center area, looking for children who have yet to be immunized.

But the neighborhood, normally teeming with children, was virtually vacant, apparently because many families left for the week rather than face the possibility of civil unrest.

“This is a crazy day to try to do something like this,” said county health worker Ricardo Ibarra.

Contributors

These Times staff writers and correspondents contributed to this story: Edward J . Boyer, Johnathon E. Briggs, Bobby Cuza, Tina Daunt, Jessica Garrison, Carla Hall, Meg James, Mitchell Landsberg, Eric Malnic, Joe Mathews, Jean Merl, Josh Meyer, Solomon Moore, Joe Mozingo, Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson, David Rosenzweig, Gina Piccalo, Bob Pool, Jeffrey L. Rabin, Margaret Ramirez, Nicholas Riccardi, Carla Rivera, Ted Rohrlich, Douglas P. Shuit, Beth Shuster, Erin Texeira, Dan Weikel and Nora Zamichow.