Hahn’s Anti-Secession Actions Challenged

Proponents of San Fernando Valley secession on Monday asked two watchdog agencies to determine whether Los Angeles Mayor James K. Hahn broke the law by using city resources to fight their movement.

In letters to the California Fair Political Practices Commission and the Los Angeles Ethics Commission, the secessionists said that the mayor had used city employees and equipment to campaign against independence for both the San Fernando Valley and Hollywood. The letters, dated Aug. 3, said the mayor’s actions violated a state law prohibiting elected officials from using public funds to fight ballot measures.

Hahn’s office admitted that it had used city resources to send out news releases and lobby against secession, but said it stopped doing so last month, after the civic breakup measures were approved for placement on the Nov. 5 ballot. A mayor’s spokeswoman said Hahn did nothing improper.

The two commissions did not comment on the secessionists’ letters, which were signed by representatives of the San Fernando Valley Independence Committee and the United Chambers of Commerce of the San Fernando Valley.

The Hollywood secession campaign has also asked the commissions to investigate Hahn’s actions. The panels can impose fines for violations of the ethics statutes.

The Valley separatists’ complaint against the mayor came as they sought to step up their campaign after weeks of perceived missteps and lagging financial support.

Secession leaders said professional political consultants will now run the campaign’s day-to-day operations, taking over from a group of mostly amateur activists.

Gerry Gunster, a campaign director for the Sacramento-based consulting firm Goddard Claussen Porter Novelli, will run the Valley campaign.

Gunster replaces Jeff Brain at the helm of the campaign, although Brain will remain president of the Valley VOTE secession group. The Valley VOTE office in Sherman Oaks will be renamed for the campaign organization, the San Fernando Valley Independence Committee.

Gunster said that he plans to hire three campaign workers and will develop a strategy for a grass-roots effort in the fall.

“The feeling on the [Valley VOTE] board was that they’ve hired a professional firm to run a campaign, and it’s time to let the professionals run it,” said Gunster.

The move was welcomed by secession supporters. “It’s at the point now where we need the pros,” said Richard Leyner, a Valley VOTE board member and candidate for city council in the proposed city.

Brain said the change was his idea, and it would free him to do more public speaking and fund-raising.

Arnold Steinberg, a Valley-based political strategist who advised early secession supporters but is not involved in the campaign, said the consultants appeared to be blaming Brain for the campaign’s stumbles, which he said was unfair. The campaign has been faulted for being unaggressive, slow to organize, and short on fund-raising skills.

“This firm [Goddard Claussen Porter Novelli] has been on board for months, and now they’re blaming Jeff,” he said. “This is an effort which never consolidated its own base in the San Fernando Valley.”

The consultants’ touch was evident at the news conference on Monday to announce the complaints against Hahn: It was held in a symbolic location, on the steps of the building in Van Nuys that could be the new municipality’s city hall if secession passes. Participants were flanked by giant copies of anti-secession e-mail news releases sent by the mayor’s office, offered as proof that Hahn had misused city resources.

A spokeswoman for Hahn said the use of city resources to distribute anti-secession news releases was legal because the cityhood proposals did not become ballot initiatives until late July, when laws barring such activity first applied to the campaign.

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted on July 25 to place Valley secession on the ballot, and the Local Agency Formation Commission did the same with Hollywood secession on July 26.

Since July 25, Hahn spokeswoman Julie Wong said, the mayor’s staff has not issued anti-secession news releases or held events that could be construed as part of Hahn’s anti-breakup campaign.

Stephen Kaufman, a Los Angeles attorney specializing in election law, said the prohibitions against using public resources to fight ballot measures would not apply before the July 25 Board of Supervisors’ action.

“Before this became an actual ballot measure, it was simply a city issue,” Kaufman said. “The mayor’s office had the right and the ability to communicate from the mayor’s office to the public on this issue.”