Candidates Stay Focused on Schools

On the second consecutive day in which the mayoral candidates focused on the state of the city’s public schools, Los Angeles Mayor James K. Hahn on Tuesday challenged Councilman Antonio Villaraigosa to a debate on education.

Villaraigosa, who spent the afternoon with students at San Fernando High School, said he finds it “interesting that the mayor wants to debate when for six months ... he was missing in action. We couldn’t get him at a debate.”

Hahn did attend some debates, but he also skipped more than the other candidates.

Trailed by half a dozen television cameras, Hahn appeared before the Los Angeles Unified School District board Tuesday morning to urge it to adopt a small-schools reform proposal.

Since last week’s election, the two candidates in the May 17 runoff have tried to demonstrate that they understand education is the No. 1 issue to voters, even though the mayor has little control over city schools.

Villaraigosa’s campaign also issued a news release -- titled “Jimmy Hahn, Please Report to the Principal’s Office” -- chastising Hahn for not being more involved in education during his first term and stating that Hahn’s appearance Tuesday represented just his second time speaking before the school board as mayor.

School board members greeted Hahn politely, although some chided him for embracing the latest education fad without an in-depth study on how the district already handles school size.

Some board members said Hahn had come to the wrong meeting. They were set to discuss reform in the afternoon. In the morning, when Hahn appeared, the topics were budgets and health textbooks, prompting board member David Tokofsky to suggest that Hahn instead address abstinence.

The mayor abstained.

Hahn urged the board members to consider creating “small, high-performing schools for every kid in Los Angeles.” That proposal is being pushed by the Small Schools Alliance, which last month launched a $1.5-million campaign aimed at securing pledges of support for small schools from the city’s mayoral candidates.

The group’s chairman, Steve Barr, founder of the charter school group Green Dot Public Schools, wants the district to pledge to embrace six tenets, including limiting enrollments at each school to fewer than 500 students, keeping campuses open until 5 p.m. and requiring parents to volunteer at schools.

Hahn and Villaraigosa have signed the pledge. It also has the support of some school board members, including board President Jose Huizar. But others appeared skeptical. Board member Julie Kornstein said the district is already doing many of those things, and colleague Marguerite Poindexter LaMotte snapped, “I refuse to politicize the education of children.”

In a city where voters have consistently told pollsters that public education was their top concern, both mayoral candidates Tuesday stressed their own education credentials. Hahn touted his expansion of LA’s BEST, a city-funded after-school program, and said he sends his children to public school. Villaraigosa’s children attend Catholic school.

During Hahn’s tenure, the city has expanded LA’s BEST to more than 50 elementary schools, but it is not on all campuses, despite Hahn’s 2001 promise to take the program to “every elementary school” in the district.

Addressing high school students in Pacoima, Villaraigosa talked of the $9-billion school bond issue he championed while he was Assembly speaker.

Also Tuesday, Hahn met with neighbors at a home in Toluca Lake. He listened to their concerns about traffic and an influx of big apartment buildings in their neighborhood. In response to a question, Hahn criticized Villaraigosa’s decision to run for mayor. “He promised he wasn’t going to run,” Hahn said, referring to Villaraigosa’s pledge to his council constituents that he would serve a full four-year term when he was elected in 2002. “Now I feel like he never really was honest with me.” When asked about those comments, Villaraigosa said he intended to focus on “positive pursuits.”