A Park and a Promise

Confronted with the passionate complaint of a community leader who said her neighborhood park has been neglected for decades, Mayor Richard Riordan on Wednesday put his personal credibility on the line by promising to fix the problem within two weeks.

Helen Johnson, who has lived in the neighborhood for 47 years, gently raised the issue of her community park during a morning meeting with Riordan in the LAPD’s Wilshire Division, a busy area for police and a bustlingly diverse swath of the city.

“We do have a crime problem that is a bad problem over there,” she said. “Nothing has been done in our park in 35 years. . . . We don’t have lighting. We don’t have anything.”

Riordan’s response was quick and unequivocal: “It’ll all be done in two weeks.”

Although the mayor then seemed to back off, joking that he thought he’d said two months, a personal conversation with Johnson after the meeting steeled his resolve. Johnson’s daughter was shot and badly hurt in late September, and as Johnson whispered the details to Riordan, both of them--a white-haired African American woman in a T-shirt and a multimillionaire mayor nearing the end of his eight years in office--choked back tears.

Riordan, who lost two of his own children to tragedies, cupped Johnson’s face in his hands and said softly: “Helen, until it happens to other people, they don’t know what it’s like.”

Leaving the meeting, Riordan was asked whether he could transform the Vermont Square Park in two weeks, as he had promised.

“Damn right,” he responded.

Wednesday afternoon, the park was quiet, sprinklers clattering as gardeners swept up piles of leaves. But nightfall generally transforms it, Johnson said: Drug dealers and gamblers gather; fights and shootings all too often follow.

She wants the trees trimmed to eliminate hiding places and lights installed to discourage illegal activity. She also asked Riordan and his aides to see if they could encourage the Los Angeles Police Department to step up patrols in the area.

Afterward, Johnson made clear that she intends to hold Riordan to his promise.

“Otherwise,” she said, “he’ll hear from me.”

Riordan’s appearance in the Wilshire Division on Wednesday came as part of a focused effort designed to demonstrate that the mayor has taken command of the city’s complicated policing problems. Riordan signaled his new initiative in a speech at the Police Academy last month and has followed it up with a series of police and community meetings, using each to emphasize his commitment to reforming the LAPD, as well as to addressing problems of recruiting and morale, both of which are taking a heavy toll on the department.

The sustained focus on the LAPD in some ways represents a departure for Riordan, who spent much of early 2000 involved in the preparations for the Democratic National Convention. After the convention, Riordan seemed to lower his profile and then took significant heat for planning a vacation during the Metropolitan Transportation Authority strike.

On Wednesday, however, Riordan was engaged and energetic, fielding questions and suggestions with humor and enthusiasm. In addition to meeting with residents, he briefly toured businesses at a mall that spoke of the Wilshire Division’s extraordinary diversity: One small stretch of storefronts included Louisiana’s Famous Fried Chicken, Little Beijing, El Rincon Mexican restaurant, a check cashing outlet and a barbershop that caters primarily to African American customers.

In his remarks, Riordan acknowledged that not all is well with the LAPD, a tough admission by a mayor who has devoted much of his time in office to the rebuilding of the Police Department.

“Morale at the department,” Riordan conceded at one point, “is probably at an all-time low.”

But rather than dwell on that problem or on the LAPD’s continuing struggle to recruit officers quickly enough to keep up with attrition, the mayor solicited suggestions from community members, an eclectic group that included block club leaders, community police advisory board members, a middle school assistant principal and an official from Childrens Hospital, among others.

Most of those who gathered around the table on Wednesday were focused, not on the LAPD’s scandals, but on their shared fear that crime is rising in their area and that they are vulnerable.

Several participants asked for more foot or bike patrols. Others suggested that the return of the senior lead officer program, which devotes officers to community problem-solving, has been too slow. And a number of speakers complained about Police Chief Bernard C. Parks, whom they see as a foe of community policing.

“I think our city should seriously consider terminating the contract of Chief Parks,” one man said, prompting others to applaud. Echoing that sentiment, another said he did not believe community policing could succeed in Los Angeles as long as Parks remains in office.

Riordan, who appointed Parks and who has stood by him on almost every important LAPD issue of recent years, did not respond directly to the criticism of the chief. Afterward, however, Riordan said he would share the comments with Parks.

Although Wednesday’s session was devoted to community and policing questions, Riordan also was confronted with a bevy of questions regarding his recent comments about the Belmont Learning Complex.

As he has in recent days, Riordan expressed his desire for state legislation that would set environmental standards for the troubled project and then relieve whoever occupies it of liability so long as those standards are met.

But Riordan steadfastly refused to be drawn into saying whether he thought the site should be turned into a school or offered for sale.

“No matter who is there, you have to solve these mitigation problems,” Riordan said.