Political Intrigue an Ingredient in City Budget Stew

Amid some political intrigue, city budget hearings opened Thursday as Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s office began making its case for increasing trash fees to pay for more police officers.

At the same time, the politics surrounding the budget heated up as word spread in City Hall that Villaraigosa planned to endorse Assemblywoman Cindy Montanez (D-San Fernando) over Councilman Alex Padilla in the race for the state Senate’s 20th District seat in the San Fernando Valley.

Villaraigosa’s repudiation of a former council colleague poses the question of whether he can afford to antagonize Padilla as his budget plan, which includes the trash fee increase, heads to a council vote in coming weeks.

Trash fee hikes for homeowners have been talked about for decades in City Hall but have usually died quickly for lack of political support. Villaraigosa’s effort is the latest incarnation and needs the council’s support.

Villaraigosa also is trying to assume control of the Los Angeles Unified School District, which will be no easy feat. That issue also involves Padilla -- he helped create a 30-member commission last year to study how the district is run, but his panel’s work has largely been ignored by the mayor’s office.

On Thursday, the mayor’s office again touted the trash-fee-for-police-officers plan before the council’s budget panel. The five-member committee will spend the next two weeks vetting the mayor’s budget and then recommend changes before it goes to the full council for a vote, probably by mid-May.

Calling the police-hiring plan “the centerpiece of the budget and its highest priority,” Deputy Mayor Karen Sisson said the Police Department’s recruitment strategy needs to be reinvented to lure more people to the job.

The city needs to hire about 3,500 officers over the next four years to achieve a net gain of 1,000 because of attrition.

In what amounted to a de facto endorsement of the mayor’s priorities, three council members -- Eric Garcetti, Wendy Greuel and Jack Weiss -- last Friday introduced a motion that asked the city attorney to explore ways that money for new officers could be put in a “lockbox” and used for police only.

That proposal probably will emerge as one of the budget’s more controversial elements during debates. Some will probably argue that it amounts to the illegal use of a fee for an unrelated program.

Others might not want to have their hands tied.

“Yes, we’re taking away our discretionary authority, and that’s the point,” Greuel said. “I don’t want to see our priorities change every year; public safety is our No. 1 priority.”

Ultimately, Villaraigosa will need support for his trash fee from eight of the 15 council members. Can he count on Padilla, who has yet to publicly take a position? And if not, can the mayor win approval without him?

Padilla, who was first elected to the council in 1999, is its longest-serving member and was president for 4 1/2 years, despite behind-the-scenes challenges from his peers to his election to the post.

Only last summer, at an event celebrating Padilla’s reelection to the council, Villaraigosa said Padilla helped pave his way to the mayor’s office.

“Four years ago I knocked on a door ... that some opened and some just weren’t sure about,” Villaraigosa said then.

“It was actually your election as president of the City Council that I think helped to open the door for me.”

Padilla, through a spokesman, declined to comment on the pending endorsement, as did the mayor’s press office.