Villaraigosa Calls for Criminal Probe of Tonsich

Mayoral candidate Antonio Villaraigosa and two Los Angeles City Council allies called Tuesday for a criminal investigation into the business dealings of Mayor James K. Hahn’s Harbor Commission president.

The Times reported Tuesday that Commissioner Nicholas G. Tonsich’s law firm received no-bid government contracts as well as a payment from a lobbyist who reported lobbying the Harbor Commission.

“It’s clear from what I read today there should be at a minimum an Ethics Commission investigation, and maybe much further than that,” Villaraigosa told reporters after The Times detailed how Tonsich had benefited from his connection to the mayor.

“There were a number of issues there that were frankly very disturbing.”

Councilmen Jack Weiss and Bernard C. Parks, who have endorsed Villaraigosa, also called on Hahn to ask Tonsich to resign from the Harbor Commission and to join them in asking for an investigation by the city Ethics Commission, the Los Angeles County district attorney and the U.S. attorney.

Hahn said Tuesday afternoon he had “no intention” of asking Tonsich to resign. “I think that Nick Tonsich has done a great job at the Port of Los Angeles,” Hahn said, citing the San Pedro attorney’s work on environmental and security issues there.

Tonsich has said he received no special treatment from Hahn or his appointees, and Hahn has said he gave Tonsich no special consideration.

Tonsich and his family have donated nearly $12,000 to the mayor and his sister, Councilwoman Janice Hahn, since 1999. Tonsich’s legal partners and their families, the firm’s clients and a fundraising event that Tonsich held brought the Hahns at least $30,000 more.

Villaraigosa, Weiss and Parks said they specifically were concerned to learn that Tonsich’s law firm has earned $1.254 million worth of no-bid contracts from the Alameda Corridor Transportation Authority, a public agency whose legal contracting work was overseen by a Hahn appointee.

The authority, which is conducting its own investigation, can find no record of how Tonsich’s firm was selected.

In addition, the councilmen said they were troubled to learn that the city attorney’s office under Hahn approved Tonsich’s law firm to receive city contracts to represent police officers in Rampart corruption cases. Tonsich’s firm cited only one case of defending government agencies and none defending police officers.

The councilmen also said any investigation should look into a payment of at least $10,000 made by lobbyist Clark Davis to Tonsich’s firm in 2003. That same year, Davis reported that he lobbied the Harbor Commission for one client, which later received a $3.3-million master-planning contract from the Harbor Commission. Tonsich did not vote on that contract.

Davis and Tonsich told The Times that they could not recall what work Tonsich had done for Davis. But Tonsich said Monday it had nothing to do with Davis clients who had business at the port.

Defending his work on the Harbor Commission, Tonsich issued a statement through the port Tuesday afternoon stating that he could not discuss his work for Davis because of attorney-client privilege.

Councilwoman Hahn, who is a member of the Alameda Corridor board, offered a more vigorous defense of Tonsich, disputing the comments by Weiss and Parks as “distortions.”

She said the payment by Davis is “not pay to play” and has nothing to do with the mayor. And she predicted that an internal Alameda Corridor investigation “will find there was no wrongdoing.”

The councilwoman also praised Tonsich for his work at the port.

“He’s been absolutely what the community wanted for 100 years, a commissioner willing to challenge the port on issues, including clean air,” she said.

Parks, whose unsuccessful mayoral campaign hammered Hahn’s fundraising practices, said Tuesday marked at least the third time he has called for an investigation of one of the mayor’s appointees.

“This is another indication of business as usual, corruption in this city. And that we need to bring it to an end,” said the former police chief.

The dispute over Tonsich came on a day when both Hahn and Villaraigosa alleged that the other has fallen short in making Los Angeles safe.

Villaraigosa took a helicopter tour of the Port of Los Angeles and declared the bustling harbor vulnerable to terrorists because of what he said was Hahn’s failure to make port security a priority.

The mayor, whose administration fiercely disputed that characterization, summoned reporters to his Wilshire Boulevard headquarters to attack Villaraigosa for voting against a state law that toughened the penalties against child abusers who kill a child.

Villaraigosa campaign manager Ace Smith said Hahn was taking the former Assembly speaker’s votes out of context.

Also Tuesday, the Los Angeles Police Protective League, which represents Los Angeles Police Department officers, said it will launch a $149,000 independent campaign with mailers praising Hahn for helping to reduce crime.

At City Hall, Weiss and council members Wendy Greuel and Cindy Miscikowski on Tuesday introduced a motion calling for the Ethics Commission to enforce a 1972 law that requires commissioners to file a report within 10 days of receiving a loan, grant, lease or any type of contract from the city. The Ethics Commission voted 4 to 1 on Tuesday to support the change.

*

Times staff writer Jessica Garrison contributed to this report.