Finally, a Hotline to Report Hacks

For several weeks now, I’ve been waiting for an opportune time to set up a Hack Hotline, and former Los Angeles City Councilman Richard Alatorre has finally inspired me to get it up and running.

If you’d like to drop the dime on a public servant who’s a no-show, a double-dipper, a knave or a scamster, all you’ll have to do is pick up the phone and notify the Hack Hotline. Operators will be waiting, and your privacy always will be protected.

I almost got the hotline running two weeks ago, after getting a tip about a former city official recommended for a $245,000 consulting contract to advise Los Angeles City Council on the ins and outs of public toilets.

But I knew it couldn’t be put off a minute longer when Times lancers Rich Connell and Robert J. Lopez (no relation) reported this week on a sweet deal former Mayor Richard Riordan swung for his buddy Alatorre back in March.

Had the Hack Hotline been in operation, Riordan might not have gotten away with it for so long. An alert public servant, possibly someone ticked off about not getting in on the action himself, would have alerted the Hack Hotline and all parties would have been publicly flogged in this little corner of the newspaper.

Alatorre, the fallen Eastside kingmaker, once tested positive for cocaine, and no one but his wife would call him a model citizen. On Monday, he’s expected to be placed under home detention for pocketing $41,840 from various operatives who were doing their best to influence him while he was in office.

But that didn’t stop Riordan from helping set Alatorre up with a contract worth up to $95,000 to collect debts owed to the Department of Water and Power.

It’s hard to imagine how Alatorre found time for the demands of this high-powered job. He already was enduring the stress of a $9,500-a-month political appointment to the California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board.

Of course, nobody seems to be too sure what Alatorre did to earn his pay at DWP. “He wasn’t working for me,” said the former general manager. “We were funding a person that the mayor wanted to hire.”

It’s the perfect government job. Not only does nobody know exactly what you’re doing--nobody knows whom you’re working for.

One DWP official said “strategic assistance” was a particular specialty of Alatorre’s, and explained that he had help set up a phone call between DWP and state officials. It is not clear whether Alatorre actually located the correct phone numbers, punched them in, or synchronized everyone’s watches.

I don’t know how he does it, but I don’t mind admitting that I’m jealous. Since being eyeballed by the FBI and IRS for four years and leaving public office in shame in 1999, Alatorre hasn’t just kept feeding at the trough.

He’s gotten a raise.

If Riordan weren’t cycling for croissants, or wherever he is on the current vacation, I’d love to ask where he draws the line on the back-scratching. He’s thinking about running for governor, after all, and I’d just like to know what we’re in for.

Let’s say Alatorre had knocked over old ladies and snatched their purses. Would Riordan have set him up somewhere as a public safety consultant?

Earlier this year, Riordan was trashing politicians who neglect poor neighborhoods. The kind of hacks, he said, who work “to get friends of theirs contracts, jobs, and you see this with the poverty pimps.”

Time is a wasting, my friends. This kind of pompous hypocrisy could and must be reported to the Hack Hotline from here on out, so that the responsible parties can immediately be held up to public ridicule.

In a delicious irony, one of the accusations against Alatorre involved a developer who allegedly financed thousands of dollars in home improvements at Casa Alatorre. How tough can home detention be, parked in your Barcalounger with a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos after the pad’s been spiffed up?

By the way, I put in a call to Alatorre and I’m waiting to hear back. I don’t know how many consulting gigs he’s going to be juggling while lounging around the house, but I can use a little help running the hotline.

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Fraud? Sloth? General incompetence? Drop the dime on friend or foe today. Leave a tip on the Hack Hotline day or night at 213-237-6555, or at steve.lopez@latimes.com.