Hahn Hires Lobbyist to Help Get U.S. Funds

Criticized during the secession debate for Los Angeles’ poor record of getting help from Washington and Sacramento, Mayor James K. Hahn is moving to boost the city’s clout by hiring a prominent lobbyist in the nation’s capital and rallying the area’s legislators to begin acting more as a team.

Hahn is putting together a $228,000 annual contract with the high-powered DC lobbyist/law firm Patton Boggs and met this week with seven members of the city’s congressional delegation to better coordinate the city’s pitch for more money from the federal government.

“We are bringing on some lobbying help in Washington so we get our fair share back there,” Hahn told 70 San Fernando Valley secession activists at a meeting last week in Encino.

The mayor also addressed concerns that the city’s state and federal legislative delegations are not effectively working together to bring the city help.

“During the campaign, the mayor was saying we should stay together because Los Angeles has more clout in Washington if it is a larger city,” said David Hernandez, a secession leader. “But what we saw was other, smaller cities were getting more grants. The city representatives were not paying attention to Los Angeles’ needs.”

A study last summer by the Rose Institute of State and Local Government in Claremont found that Los Angeles ranked 38th among the 88 cities in Los Angeles County in per capita state funding, and eighth for federal funding.

“The city, relative to its size, has been particularly ineffective in influencing its congressional delegation and its state legislative delegation,” said Steven B. Frates, author of the study. Frates said a lack of coordination is just one factor. He said the local members of Congress who are most influential, notably Reps. Howard Berman and Henry Waxman, both Democrats, “have not particularly cared about the city. They have cared more about national issues.”

Berman, who was one of the members of Congress who met with Hahn, disagreed and said he is very active in looking out for Los Angeles. He said he does not believe that there is a lack of coordination among the city’s representatives in Washington.

“To me, the biggest concern hasn’t been coordination. It’s getting the data to support our efforts in Washington from the city,” Berman said.

To persuade the Bush administration to increase federal funding for police officers, Berman said, the city needs to supply him with data showing how the LAPD has declined in numbers and diverted resources to the anti-terrorism fight.

Hahn’s effort to bring the congressional delegation together was widely praised, but there were signs that the mayor has his work cut out for him.

Hahn invited the 14 members of Congress who represent parts of Los Angeles to meet in his office last Thursday to discuss how they can help combat the city’s escalating gang violence. Despite widespread news coverage and public proclamations about a spate of gang shootings, only six showed up.

Hahn met with Democratic Reps. Xavier Becerra, Maxine Waters, Juanita Millender-McDonald, Lucille Roybal-Allard, Diane Watson and Berman to ask them to press for more federal funds for law enforcement programs. Hahn met separately with U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) on the same issue and plans to follow up the sessions with a January trip to Washington.

All the representatives who attended Thursday’s meeting pledged their support.

“Every member of Congress we met with today hears over and over again the problems of violence in their districts, and they are working very tirelessly to see that we are doing something positive, that we are part of a coordinated approach to make that happen,” Hahn said after the meeting at City Hall.

Roybal-Allard said Democratic lawmakers do a pretty good job of working as a team for Los Angeles.

“We talk a lot,” she said, noting that Democratic members of Congress from California or their representatives meet every Wednesday to discuss issues of common interest to the state. City issues frequently come up at those sessions, she said.

The hiring of Patton Boggs could help the Democratic Mayor Hahn make some headway with Republicans in Congress. “They have good connections with the Republican side of the house, which is a pretty good-sized side right now,” said Ron Deaton, Los Angeles’ chief legislative analyst.

The firm has begun working with the three city employees who lobby in Washington for Los Angeles. The city once had four people each in Washington and Sacramento, but the state Capitol crew is down to one lobbyist and a secretary.

With the governor and Legislature preparing to deal with a budget deficit that has soared to $34.8 billion, mayoral spokeswoman Julie Wong said the mayor might try to hire more lobbying help in Sacramento in the near future to protect the city’s interests.

Hahn also told secession leaders last week that he has spoken with state legislators about meeting to coordinate efforts to help Los Angeles.

Such meetings are a good step, said Rep. Millender-McDonald. “The mayor said he wants this [meeting] to be a regular thing, and I agree.”