Council OKs Police Reform Pact With U.S.

The Los Angeles City Council on Thursday approved a historic settlement with the federal government to reform and restructure the Los Angeles Police Department.

Earlier in the day, a reluctant, visibly conflicted Mayor Richard Riordan said he would sign the so-called consent decree despite his deep philosophical reservations about its implications.

“As mayor of the city of Los Angeles, I have often had tough days,” Riordan said, “but I can think of none tougher than today.” The mayor was joined at his news conference by two City Council members, but not by his police chief, Bernard C. Parks.

Still, Riordan pledged to sign the deal once the council approved it, which it did by an 11-2 vote later in the day. That ended the political wrangling just hours after an eleventh-hour legal challenge by the city’s police union failed to derail the settlement in court.

As a result, the LAPD--which for decades has waged a complicated campaign of reform and resistance--soon will come under the most sweeping set of changes ever imposed on it from outside. Although the decree’s most profound impact will be felt in Los Angeles, it will reverberate in Washington.

Los Angeles is the largest police department ever placed under court monitoring as a result of the U.S. Department of Justice’s authority to sue police agencies alleged to have engaged in a “pattern or practice” of civil rights violations. Federal officials are considering a similar course in New York, where allegations of racism, brutality and corruption have dogged the NYPD, particularly the department’s street enforcement units.

In Washington on Thursday, Atty. Gen. Janet Reno said she sees the LAPD agreement as an “extraordinary challenge and an opportunity” to ensure that high standards of policing are established and enforced in Los Angeles. A number of city officials shared her view.

Speaking at an afternoon news conference, City Atty. James Hahn said he believes the decree will finally bring about “meaningful reform” in the LAPD.

“This is only the beginning,” said Hahn, who helped negotiate the decree. “Now the real work begins. . . . We all recognize that over the years there were many good intentions to achieve reform. We did not realize those intentions. We did not complete what needed to be done in the city of Los Angeles. Now this document gives us what was missing before and that’s the commitment to see that it gets done.”

Police Commission President Gerald L. Chaleff, who also served on the city’s negotiating team, agreed.

“We have achieved something significant,” Chaleff said. “The foundations laid out by this agreement will help improve the department and increase the citizens’ level of confidence and trust.”

Bill Lann Lee, the Justice Department’s assistant attorney general for civil rights, called the agreement “historic and comprehensive.” It builds, Lee said, “on the foundation for police reform laid almost 10 years ago by implementing key unresolved Christopher Commission recommendations, including fortifying the responsibility and authority of the Police Commission and inspector general.

“Overall, the consent decree will hold city officials directly accountable to the public and the court for their progress in making these historic reforms,” Lee said.

The agreement--hammered out after six months of negotiations--includes dozens of fixes aimed at overhauling the LAPD. It would:

* Implement a new, computerized “early warning” system to track the law enforcement activities of all officers, thus enabling LAPD managers and supervisors to address at-risk conduct and make informed decisions on promotions and transfers.

* Prohibit officers from relying on race or ethnicity when making traffic or pedestrian stops, except when attempting to locate a suspect who has been identified by such characteristics.

* Create a new LAPD unit of specially trained officers responsible for “rolling out” and investigating officer-involved shootings and other significant uses of force.

* Institute a study and review process to ensure that the LAPD uses appropriate measures for responding to people with mental illness.

* Expand the roles of the Police Commission and its inspector general to give them greater latitude in reviewing all categorical uses of force and the results of required audits to determine whether any policy changes are needed.

Finally, the document gives the civilian commission the power to evaluate and even discipline Parks on how well he implements the provisions of the agreement.

The final document is expected to be filed in federal court early next week, when it will be assigned to a judge who will have the power to oversee it and to hold officials in contempt if they fail to live up to its terms.

Members of the Los Angeles Police Protective League--who failed in their attempt in Superior Court on Thursday to halt the agreement--said they will take their fight to federal court to ensure the city meets and confers with the union on key provisions, as the union believes its contract requires.

“When you have a major proposal on police reform, the union should be at the table,” said Hank Hernandez, the league’s general counsel. “Here they are ratifying the agreement, which they hammered out in secret, and they are only giving the union lip service.”

What effect--if any--the agreement would have on public safety and police corruption remains to be seen, though virtually all the involved parties agree that the future will turn largely on the selection of the person who will be charged with monitoring the Police Department’s compliance.

The decree requires that person to be picked by March 1, 2001. Once in place, the monitor will have broad access to LAPD employees and records and will write quarterly reports updating the supervising judge and the public on the city’s progress toward complying with the provisions of the 114-page document.

None of those involved in the talks expect that to be simple. Indeed, even as the decree was being approved Thursday, there were glimmers of the struggles ahead: Conspicuous by his absence at Riordan’s news conference was Parks, who almost invariably appears at Riordan’s side when important issues involving the LAPD are being discussed.

Parks spent months fighting the decree, shuttling to Washington to make his case to federal officials and lobbying locally as well. Although Parks now has pledged to implement whatever deal the city cuts--and LAPD officials already have begun assigning staff to supervise implementation--the chief has made it clear to those close to him that he is not happy about it. Asked Thursday why Parks was not at the news conference, Riordan said he “did not think it was suitable for him to be here today.”

Late in the day, Parks issued a prepared statement: “While change is difficult, I am confident that the commitment of the men and women of the Los Angeles Police Department will ensure a successful effort on our part to implement the consent decree and a continued level of professional service to our community.”

Council members, meanwhile, said they believed the city had little choice but to accept the decree. The U.S. Department of Justice made it clear early on that without the agreement, it would sue the city and most likely win.

The city lawmakers--who approved the bulk of the agreement in concept in September--cast their votes after less than an hour of discussion.

“The choice is very plain for us,” said Councilman Mike Feuer. “We can be sued and lose and have a federal judge tell us how to run the Police Department or we can actually affirmatively choose to take some control.”

Councilwoman Laura Chick agreed. “I think what is before us is about as good as it can get in terms of a consent decree,” she said. “We have too long of a history . . . of unresolved and unsolved problems in our LAPD. One has to hope that this is the last big step to finally self correct.”

Nate Holden and Hal Bernson were the only council members to vote against the settlement.

“We’re giving up control, which belongs to local government, to the federal government,” Bernson told his colleagues. “I think that flies in the face of everything that any of us involved in local government ever want.”

Holden warned: “You won’t know the damage you’ve done until it’s too late.”

The two council members’ comments reflected the concerns held by Riordan. For months, the mayor’s deliberations over the decree have tested him and his staff, and they continued up until the final moments before his announcement Thursday morning.

Concerned about language in the document that could be construed as giving the Justice Department an ongoing role in investigating the Police Department, Riordan bargained with federal officials for an agreement giving the primary investigative role to the monitor, not the Justice Department. As reporters waited for the mayor’s news conference to begin, Riordan went so far as to threaten to walk away from the deal, if his concerns were not addressed, officials said. When they were, Riordan walked across the hall and addressed reporters--without mentioning the brinkmanship in which he had been engaged just moments before.

And yet, even in announcing that he intended to sign the decree, Riordan continued to telegraph his deep ambivalence about the deal.

He said the settlement satisfied his main concerns, which include preserving local control and oversight over the LAPD and imposing a five-year deadline on the decree’s duration, though that could be extended if the city has not been in compliance for two full years and the Justice Department goes to court to seek extra time. The document, Riordan said, also builds on some reforms already underway, an assessment echoed by federal officials.

But Riordan could not bring himself to express much optimism about the effects of the decree.

Asked whether the deal would make the LAPD a better Police Department, Riordan answered: “I think the Police Department will be better with or without the decree.”

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Times staff writer Eric Lichtblau in Washington contributed to this article.