Commissioners Stress Parks’ Fate Isn’t Decided

Wherever David Cunningham goes, the questions come at him: “What are you going to do? What’s going to happen?”

As one of five members of the Los Angeles Police Commission, Cunningham, 47, will cast a vote on the city’s most burning issue: whether Police Chief Bernard C. Parks will serve a second five-year term, despite the opposition of Mayor James K. Hahn.

As a result, Cunningham, a land-use attorney, and his colleagues find themselves in the spotlight--suspected keepers of secrets, protagonists in conspiracy theories.

Family members, friends and strangers ambush them with questions. “I’ve gotten phone calls from people I haven’t seen in years,” Cunningham says.

To all, his answer is the same. He, along with his colleagues, won’t decide the chief’s fate until they have had a chance to evaluate his performance through a formal review process. That’s his story, and he keeps repeating it, but he concedes, “It’s hard for people to really believe.”

When Hahn, who appointed the five commission members, recently announced that he opposed a new term for the chief, he opened the curtain on a full-fledged political drama. Many observers assume that the outcome is foretold, but there remains enough uncertainty to inflame speculation.

In interviews, four commissioners--Cunningham, developer Rick Caruso, former U.S. Department of Justice official Rose Ochi and attorney Silvia Saucedo--said the issue has brought them intense attention. The fifth, San Fernando Valley car dealer Bert Boeckmann, did not return phone calls seeking comment.

Ochi is eager to discuss the latest rumors.

When told that one version casts her as the swing vote, her eyes widen. “Is that right?” she exclaims. “Is that what they are saying? No wonder I’m getting all these phone calls!”

Saucedo calls the various scenarios “interesting” but says they don’t affect her much because she is determined not to be swayed by anything but the commission’s examination of the chief’s record.

It’s an assertion that strains credulity for many City Hall observers, police officials and community activists who are closely watching the commission’s every move. Most of the speculation is on Hahn prevailing and Parks losing, while the commission’s process is viewed, at best, as a mere formality.

Commissioners have announced that they will meet in closed session to evaluate Parks over the next four to six weeks before deciding whether to keep him--subject to a City Council override.

Even among themselves, the unpaid, part-time commissioners “have tried hard not to show where we lean,” Cunningham says. “We are not just going through a sham on this.”

“We want to leave our legacy of being an independent and activist Police Commission.”

Caruso, the commission president, says that means members should represent the citizenry, not the mayor, and by extension should decide on their own whether to reappoint Parks.

The spectacle now playing out before the commission has all the usual elements of an L.A. story--suspense, race, betrayal and, of course, the LAPD. It casts Hahn, a white, first-term mayor with long and deep family ties to black political leadership, against Parks, a prominent example of black success and a local product to boot. Partisans abound. And so does speculation--despite the commissioners’ protests.

The commission members, installed in August, vary widely in age and ethnicity. Ochi is Japanese American, Boeckmann and Caruso white, Cunningham black, and Saucedo the daughter of immigrants from the Mexican state of Durango. Saucedo is the youngest, at 28. Boeckmann is the oldest, at 71.

The group is heavy on attorneys--Ochi, Caruso, Cunningham and Saucedo are law school graduates. Only one member, Boeckmann, had served on past commissions appointed by Hahn’s predecessors.

Commission members describe their relationship with Parks as uniformly polite and businesslike. Caruso, who deals with the chief most often, says that he has lunched and dined with him and that they have a “cordial, good, working relationship.”

Caruso says he sympathizes with the uncertainty of the chief’s current position--one reason, he said, that “we have an obligation to do this in a dignified manner.”

Commission Executive Director Joe Gunn says all five are willing to voice strong opinions, are unafraid of taking minority positions, and spar frequently and without animosity.

“There are no sheep on this commission,” Cunningham said.

As to whether they are beholden to the mayor, Caruso gives a sardonic answer: “What’s the worst thing--that I get fired?”

For Caruso, the job--which offers no pay for the privilege of sitting through lengthy public meetings and poring through stacks of bureaucratic reports--has proved especially nettlesome.

Last week, some Parks supporters said they were planning to stage a protest outside Caruso’s newest development, the Grove--a mall complex about to open next to Farmers Market in the Fairfax district.

They have since reconsidered after holding what they termed “productive” talks with the commission president.

Caruso has given mixed signals about his feelings on Parks’ performance.

He is assumed by some Parks supporters to share Hahn’s opposition to the chief.

But Caruso also publicly criticized Hahn’s approach early on, saying the mayor’s statements opposing Parks made the commission’s work harder. Caruso has further suggested that the city charter should give commissioners the option of reappointing the chief for a provisional one-year term--suggesting that he might want to offer Parks such a chance if the option existed.

Yet Caruso also has echoed the concerns of community groups that say that the pendulum has swung too far under Parks and that the disciplinary system he has created has so fettered officers that they no longer combat crime effectively.

Caruso, 43, is a Republican and served previously on the board of the Department of Water and Power, where he established a reputation for speaking frankly--almost to a fault, say some critics.

Cunningham, a Democrat, has served on the board of the Urban League. His father is a former Los Angeles city councilman with close ties to the late Mayor Tom Bradley.

Because of his family background, Cunningham says he is often assumed to be pro-Parks. And as an African American, Cunningham concedes that he is sympathetic to the emotions evoked by a figure such as Parks--a black man who broke race barriers to attain his present prominence.

Cunningham said he also understands the historic concerns of many Los Angeles blacks about police brutality and mistreatment, and was once spread-eagled by officers who mistook him for a robbery suspect. For some blacks, such concerns translate into backing of Parks, since curbing police mistreatment of minorities by taking citizen complaints seriously is a central tenet of the chief’s reform strategy.

Yet Cunningham bridles at the suggestion that anything might be assumed based on his family connections or race.

With regard to his father, he said he has tried to “set ... my own track record.” Nor does being black mean he will support the chief, he said. “For me, it’s a matter of conscience,” he said. “Because I am black, I will be as objective as possible. For any minority ... it’s about performance.”

Saucedo, who is just four years out of law school, has a far lower profile. The rumor mill often casts her as anti-Parks because she is Latina, and Parks’ removal might open the door to a Latino chief. But Saucedo, who grew up the daughter of a cook in the Pico-Union area, rejects this, saying, “When I think of the chief of police, I don’t attribute to him a particular race.”

She says her background helps her understand both the skepticism toward the LAPD among some blue-collar Latinos and their dependence on police to counter gang violence.

The suggestion that commissioners already have made up their minds is offensive, she said. “I mean, I swore and testified before the City Council that I was going to be independent.... I am going to hold true to that.”

Ochi, 63, had, like Cunningham, ties to Bradley, for whom she worked at City Hall on justice-related issues. A Democrat and former teacher, she has come in for especially intense lobbying from African American leaders whom she has long known. She was director of the community relations service for the U.S. Department of Justice, and has helped mediate disputes involving race and police abuse.

She said that she is so averse to expressing an opinion about Parks’ reappointment that her friends and acquaintances know not to ask her, and that she doesn’t even discuss it with her husband.

Boeckmann, a Republican who owns Galpin Ford, was first appointed to the commission under Bradley, and later reappointed by former Mayor Richard Riordan.

Although he has not spoken on the issue, speculators often surmise that Boeckmann is Parks’ most likely vote because he has strongly supported the chief in the past.

But Boeckmann once parted company with Parks in a conspicuous way: When Parks was first up for appointment by a previous commission, Boeckmann provided the one dissenting vote.

The commission has established eight criteria for measuring Parks’ performance, such as prevention of crime, reform and community policing.

A few of the criteria may favor Parks’ perceived strengths--fiscal management, for example. Other criteria strongly echo the mayor’s criticisms of the chief.

For example, Hahn has alleged that Parks has not fully implemented a community policing plan that relies on so-called senior lead officers. The commission’s criteria also include whether Parks has effectively utilized senior lead officers.

Similarly, Hahn has made a connection between recruiting and morale, saying officers’ unhappiness has depleted the force. Commissioners also make this connection, placing morale as a performance criterion under the category of retention.

The fact that the five Los Angeles residents find themselves in the position to make the decision is the result of quirks of the city’s history.

The Police Commission was created by the 1920 city charter in an effort to “diffuse power” and prevent corruption, according to USC law professor Erwin Chemerinsky.

By placing an intermediary between the mayor and chief, progressive reformers hoped to make it harder for a corrupt mayor to “dole out favors for cronies,” Chemerinsky said. Thus, the mayor appoints and fires commissioners but is not supposed to fully control them.

Fast forward a few decades, and the Police Commission could arguably be called an anachronism. Today, there is little evidence of the type of corruption it was created to combat, namely, bribery of police by public officials. Instead, use of force has dominated recent LAPD scandals.

But the commission’s role has been strengthened recently--first by a 1992 proposition that imposed term limits on Los Angeles police chiefs, then by a charter reform measure of 1999, and finally, by a 2000 federal consent decree over the LAPD, which highlights the commission’s management responsibilities.

Yet the challenge of convincing people of their sincerity still frustrates and eludes commissioners.

“Everyone is trying to say, ‘C’mon, you know you have made up your minds,’” Cunningham says.

“Well, it really and truly is important that we go through the process.... We owe that to the city. We owe that.”