Labor Puts Damper on Riordan’s City Legacy

Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan’s attempts to stamp his legacy on the city and complete his reform of city schools failed this week largely because labor mounted an aggressive campaign to curb his influence.

Riordan’s candidate for mayor, Steve Soboroff--and to a lesser degree, the people he endorsed for city controller and Congress--were unable to overcome stiff opposition from opponents who relied not only on labor money but on the countless foot soldiers that unions can muster in political campaigns.

In the Los Angeles schools race, unions cited the Riordan slate’s sweep of school board elections two years ago to recruit members and raise money for this year’s elections. The Los Angeles teachers union pumped hundreds of thousands of dollars into the campaigns of its two candidates--incumbents Julie Korenstein and Valerie Fields--and other unions across the state assisted as well.

“What the mayor did last time was a wake-up call to everybody,” said Day Higuchi, president of United Teachers-Los Angeles. “It juiced up our political action fund-raising campaign. We realized we would have to come up with really big money in school board races.”

Analysts culled a simple lesson from Tuesday’s election: When Riordan is up against strong, unified labor opposition, he loses. When he joins labor, he wins. That was confirmed in the one school board race in which his candidate won this week and in the 1999 election to the council of political novice Alex Padilla.

Riordan said Tuesday that he was surprised by labor’s strong showing in the school board races but that, overall, he does not believe the election was a rejection of his endorsements or himself.

Still, he said Wednesday, “to have labor taking control of government is not in the best interest of our city.”

Former Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa, who won the coveted backing of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO, will face City Atty. James K. Hahn in a runoff for mayor June 5. Soboroff, the candidate Riordan supported, came in third in a field of six major contenders.

Some political analysts predicted that Riordan’s losses Tuesday will affect his political legacy.

“If he cannot deliver the vote now while he’s still mayor, he won’t be a significant player later,” said Fernando Guerra, director of the Study of Los Angeles at Loyola Marymount University.

Riordan has had a mixed record in his endorsements for public office. Some say the school board elections two years ago were an anomaly. His charter reform candidates in 1997 did not fare as well.

Political consultants, analysts and labor leaders disagreed over why most of Riordan’s candidates fared poorly this time.

Miguel Contreras, executive secretary-treasurer of the county labor federation, said the outcome of Tuesday’s elections was not the result of anti-Riordan sentiment.

“I think it’s more a reflection of the candidates themselves,” Contreras said, adding, “What you’re seeing is a reflection of the educated union membership.”

The county federation--an umbrella organization representing 800,000 workers, 175,000 of whom are registered voters in the city--has become nearly a political party itself, some observers say.

Ironically, it was Riordan who brought labor and business together in City Hall over many major issues in the last eight years. He has at times been a strong union supporter.

Praise for Riordan

“It’s almost like we have a labor party here,” said Bill Carrick, a political consultant for Hahn who ran the campaigns for Riordan’s successful slate of school board candidates two years ago. “They have resources and they’re really aggressive. You saw it in the mayor’s race. . . . They’re clearly a major factor when they get involved.”

Still, some praised Riordan for getting Soboroff, a relative political unknown, into the top three mayoral finishers.

“For Soboroff to come in third was a moral victory for Riordan,” said veteran political consultant Joe Cerrell. “He took a guy from sixth or seventh [place] and made him third.”

Riordan’s candidate for city attorney, Rocky Delgadillo, made the runoff in a close race with Councilman Mike Feuer. In the council races, four of Riordan’s candidates will face runoff elections; two lost and two won outright, including one who was virtually unopposed.

But his candidate for city controller, Laurette Healey, lost outright as did Riordan-backed Councilman Nate Holden, who ran for Congress.

Riordan pledged to continue his support for school board candidates and for reforming the Los Angeles Unified School District.

“We need to continue the revolution in the schools,” Riordan said. “For too many years, the union controlled wannabe politicians on the school board. You saw what happened. Kids were denied a quality education, bureaucrats were put ahead of kids.”

The political climate was strikingly different two years ago, when Riordan supported a successful slate for the Los Angeles school board. At that time, he and his three handpicked candidates capitalized on the growing fiasco at the Belmont Learning Complex, the half-finished campus near downtown that had become synonymous with an ineffectual school board. The issue played a significant role in the ouster of three incumbents and the removal of then-Supt. Ruben Zacarias.

Belmont has since faded into the background as the school district quietly pursues new options for building or selling the site. And the school board is no longer an easy target for Riordan because his own candidates dominate it.

Meanwhile, the political terrain of Los Angeles has shifted beneath Riordan’s feet. The teachers union, stung by the mayor’s clean sweep in 1999, mounted an all-out effort to fight back in this election.

The union nearly doubled the membership on its political action committee, with 10,500 teachers, each willing to give $100 a year. And the union turned for help to a local labor movement that is increasingly Latino and resembles the city’s evolving population.

Labor Clout Could Grow

“The city is much more diverse, which makes it much more difficult for someone like Riordan, a white Republican, to be influential in these races,” said Sheldon Kamieniecki, chairman of USC’s political science department.

“If labor was influential before, it’s going to be more influential now that Villaraigosa has made it into the runoff. And it’s going to continue to be influential if we have an Hispanic mayor.”

Riordan’s only candidate to win a school board seat, attorney Jose Huizar, had garnered support from a coalition of labor organizations and prominent Latino politicians.

Huizar faced only nominal competition in the race for a district that stretches from downtown through the Eastside to South Gate and neighboring cities.

His supporters included the Los Angeles teachers union, the county Federation of Labor and the Service Employees International Union, Local 99.

Huizar said the fact that Riordan and labor endorsed him showed that the city’s two most dominant forces can coalesce around a single cause.

“We really need to work with all interested parties in order to come up with a policy that is in the best interest of our students,” he said. “I think there’s a lot of common ground. We can really work together.”

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The Day After: Top finishers James K. Hahn and Antonio Villaraigosa reach out to crucial voting blocs, A1

Term Limits: The law helped produce a record number of runoffs and set the stage for costlier races, B4

Assessing Votes: San Fernando Valley residents voted for Villaraigosa as often as they did for Soboroff, B4

Prop. A: The $1.25-billion construction bond issue will fund an ambitious renovation of community colleges, B6