L.A. Votes: Greuel, Garcetti navigate union waters, roast colleague

As the mayoral candidates crossed the two-month mark until the runoff election, Wendy Greuel and Eric Garcetti are struggling with a bit of a paradox -- the two long-time, pro-labor Democrats are jockeying over which of them is more likely to stand up to city-employee union demands.

Both candidates have labor backing, but the most influential and deep-pocketed unions have thrown their support behind Greuel. That has resulted in a political dynamic few expected -- Greuel has emerged as the de facto labor candidate while Garcetti has been painted as a union nemesis.

Greuel has been forced on the defense as some of her business backers grew uncomfortable with recent statements she made about city employee retirement benefits. On Thursday, Greuel responded to questions from the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, affirming  her support for making new cuts in pension costs and assuring them that she has no interest in challenging any of the reductions in benefits that have already been approved.

FULL COVERAGE: L.A.'s race for mayor

Garcetti and Greuel appeared together Thursday night for the first time since winning runoff spots in the March 5 primary. A swanky benefit for diabetes research at the Beverly Hilton was billed as a roast of Councilman Tom LaBonge, but most eyes were focused on the mayoral candidates. Greuel and Garcetti poked barbs at each other while they poked fun at themselves.

Meanwhile, fund-raising continues to take up large quantities of the candidates’ time as they try to replenish coffers drained by their testy primary.

Garcetti is on an East Coast fund-raising swing. Tonight, he is collecting checks at a reception at the New York City home of Hilary and Peter Hatch. Garcetti’s connection with the hosts is deep -- the councilman officiated at the couple’s 2005 wedding. Peter Hatch formerly worked for presidential candidate John Edwards and New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand. On Saturday, Garcetti heads to Miami to raise more money.

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While Greuel’s plans for the weekend haven't been disclosed, the candidate sent out a fund-raising plea to supporters Thursday that said, “Let’s make history – and then have a big group hug when we win on May 21.”

Meanwhile, in the city attorney’s race, incumbent Carmen Trutanich called on two companies to turn off more than 100 digital billboards, and opponent Mike Feuer accused him of seizing on the issue to play politics. Feuer has racked up many major endorsements in the race, but on Thursday, county Supervisor Gloria Molina bucked the trend by backing Trutanich.

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-- Seema Mehta

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Photo: Eric Garcetti and Wendy Greuel speaks to supporters at election night gatherings. Credit: Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times; Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times

L.A. Votes: Endorsements flow as Greuel and Garcetti seek edge

A new stream of endorsements emerged in Los Angeles' mayoral race Wednesday as Wendy Greuel and Eric Garcetti sought an edge in the May 21 runoff. The backing has two overarching goals – blunting criticism the two Democrats are facing about their ability to confront the most pressing financial problems in the city, and courting voters who supported candidates who did not survive the primary.

Greuel won the backing of former Republican Mayor Richard Riordan, who pledged he would serve as a senior advisor to her administration for a salary of $1 a year. This move, long sought by Greuel, comes as the city controller has faced increased heat about her support by the city’s labor unions and recent statements about her views on pension reductions for newly hired city employees. The latter prompted the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, which has backed Greuel, to call on the controller to explain her position on retirement benefits in person today.

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Greuel’s campaign hit back, with a co-chairman of her campaign, former Assembly Speaker Bob Hertzberg, promising that Greuel would fight to cut retirement costs at City Hall, including by exploring raising retirement age for existing city employees, a hugely controversial proposal.

Greuel’s rival Garcetti, who edged her in the March 5 primary, also named new endorsements on Wednesday. He picked up the backing of Republican developer Steve Soboroff and an influential African American Democratic club, which could help Garcetti make inroads with two key groups he and Greuel are battling over: white GOP voters in the Valley and black Democrats in South Los Angeles.

FULL COVERAGE: L.A.'s race for mayor

In other city races, the candidates seeking to become Los Angeles’ next city attorney clashed in the first runoff debate, with incumbent Carmen Trutanich and challenger Mike Feuer showing they have starkly different visions of the role of the city’s top prosecutor. And the statement for two competing medical marijuana initiatives survived legal challenges to appear unchanged on the May ballot.

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Photo: Former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan. Credit: Mark Boster/Los Angeles Times

Greuel to explore pension changes for existing city employees, backer says

A co-chairman of Los Angeles City Controller Wendy Greuel’s mayoral campaign told business leaders Wednesday that his candidate will explore an increase in the retirement age for current city workers.

A day before she is set to meet with the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce to explain her views on pensions, former Assembly Speaker Bob Hertzberg sent an e-mail depicting Greuel as someone who would fight to cut retirement costs at City Hall. But he also criticized a recently approved ordinance that cuts benefits for future employees as a “costly political gimmick.”

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and the City Council moved last year to increase the retirement age for future city employees from 55 to 65 for civilian city workers. Greuel's rival in the mayor's race, Councilman Eric Garcetti, voted for that change, which takes effect July 1.

“Sadly, the potential savings from the council's plan will not be realized for years and could cost the city millions in legal fees in the short-term because Mr. Garcetti and the council decided to act unilaterally, rather than including the city's working men and women in the discussion,” he said in the email.

Hertzberg repeated the argument made over the last six months by public employee unions that the city should have engaged in collective bargaining before reducing benefits for employees who have not yet been hired. That argument is the cornerstone of a challenge to the pension cuts filed by the Coalition of L.A. City Unions, which represents 18,000 city workers.

Alice Goff, president of the city union that represents clerks at City Hall, said she would not be open to a discussion on changes in the retirement benefits for existing city workers. Workers already agreed to pay more toward retiree healthcare, she said.

"Our members have already made a sacrifice and that can't be ignored," said Goff, who is with the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, District Council 36.

Villaraigosa has said repeatedly that he did not pursue cuts in benefits for existing workers because he did not believe they would withstand a legal challenge. Under state law, even if the city's workers agree to increase their retirement age, "the city has to provide them with a benefit of the same value,” said City Administrative Officer Miguel Santana, the top budget official at City Hall.

Santana also defended last year's pension vote, saying that he and his colleagues repeatedly asked for the unions’ input as they searched for ways to reduce retirement costs, holding a dozen meetings on the topic over two years. The coalition, Santana said, submitted a proposal that “would have resulted in our costs actually going up, not going down.”

The Chamber of Commerce asked Greuel to appear to explain comments she made to The Times calling for negotiations to be reopened on last fall’s pension vote. Greuel reversed herself Tuesday, saying that she only wants to hold talks with unions to try to avert a lawsuit over the pension reductions.

Greuel has repeatedly argued that the city should have engaged in collective bargaining with its unions before reducing benefits for new civilian employees. City budget watchers have warned that unions will seek new concessions before dropping their challenge.

Speaking on his own behalf in a follow-up email, Hertzberg said Greuel would secure an increase in the retirement age by negotiating with the city's employee unions. And he said the hike in retirement age for future workers "did not directly deal with current fiscal emergency.” 

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Riordan endorses Greuel, joins campaign as an advisor

Former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan on Wednesday endorsed Wendy Greuel and joined her mayoral campaign as a senior advisor on economic issues.  

Riordan, a Republican who has called for a major overhaul of the city’s pension system and who supported Republican Kevin James in the primary, said Greuel asked him to help better connect the business community and organized labor on financial issues facing the city .

"I think she sees that you’ve got to bring everybody together,” Riordan said.

FULL COVERAGE: L.A.'s race for mayor

Riordan said his role would be to help Greuel “solve the problems of the city.”

The endorsement could help Greuel capture fiscal conservatives, a demographic largely up for grabs after James' defeat in the primary. 

For months, Riordan has been warning that spiraling pension costs have placed the city on the brink of bankruptcy. He pushed unsuccessfully for a ballot measure that would require all new city employees to rely on 401(k)-style retirement plans instead of guaranteed pensions.

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In contrast, Greuel has spent weeks attacking her opponent Eric Garcetti and the City Council for hiking the retirement age and rolling back the size of pension benefits for newly hired city workers on the grounds that collective bargaining was not used in those negotiations.

Riordan’s announcement came the day after Greuel received the endorsement of the 600,000-member Los Angeles County Federation of Labor. She also locked up the support of an array of city unions after she argued that the council failed to properly negotiate those pension changes with union leaders. That argument is now a key element in a challenge filed by union officials, who are hoping to overturn the pension reductions before they take effect July 1.

Garcetti said that the council’s pension vote, which is aimed at saving $4 billion over 30 years, was the right one.

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Photo: Former Mayor Richard Riordan in November 2012. Credit: Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times

Garcetti picks up supporters in key demographics

Los Angeles mayoral candidate Eric Garcetti picked up support from a prominent Republican leader and an influential African American Democratic club on Wednesday.

The endorsements from Playa Vista developer Steve Soboroff and the New Frontier Democratic Club could help Garcetti make inroads with two groups he and his opponent Wendy Greuel are battling over: white GOP voters and black Democrats. Those constituencies voted overwhelmingly in the primary for loosing candidates Kevin James, a Republican, and Los Angeles City Councilwoman Jan Perry, a Democrat who is African American.

Neither Perry nor James have announced whether they will endorse in the runoff, although the actions of several Perry backers on Tuesday suggested she may be close to backing Garcetti. Several members of Perry's campaign and council staff showed up at the New Frontier endorsement meeting Tuesday night sporting Garcetti buttons, including Perry's campaign spokeswoman, Helen Sanchez.

FULL COVERAGE: L.A.'s race for mayor

Sanchez said Perry told her staff "they were free to do whatever they want in the election,” and said Perry was still “mulling” an endorsement.

The club, which backed Perry in the primary, voted 71 to 22 to back Garcetti. Greuel's attacks on Perry's past financial problems -- she and her then-husband filed jointly for bankruptcy in 1994 -- may have played into the overwhelming vote for Garcetti. On each seat at the meeting, there was a copy of a letter from the California National Organization of Women blasting Greuel for highlighting Perry’s bankruptcy.

Meanwhile, Garcetti and Greuel have been courting James. Garcetti shared dinner with the former candidate two weeks ago and on Friday, Greuel met with him and former Mayor Richard Riordan to talk about an endorsement on Friday, according to Riordan, who said after the meeting that he had not decided whether to back Greuel.

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A Republican who has pushed to scale back pension benefits for city employees, Riordan's endorsement could help Greuel among conservative voters. But her endorsement by city employee unions that have fought Riordan's proposals -- and her backing this week from the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor -- could complicate that.

Garcetti's team hopes Soboroff's support will help them earn San Fernando Valley votes. Soboroff, who lost a bid for mayor in the primary in 2001 despite broad support among voters in the Valley, recorded a video for Garcetti. In a news release, he asks his supporters to vote for Garcetti, whom he said would bring services to “both sides of the hill.”

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Photo: Former Los Angeles mayoral candidate Steve Soboroff. Credit: Katie Falkenberg/Los Angeles Times

Backers of dueling medical pot measures tangle in court

A Superior Court judge ruled Wednesday that ballot arguments for two opposing Los Angeles medical marijuana measures do not violate the law and should appear as they were written in the city's official voter guide.

Attorneys for both measures had alleged the other side violated the city election code.

Lawyers for Proposition D, which is backed by the City Council and a labor union representing marijuana dispensary workers, sued the city first. They claimed the ballot argument in favor of the competing Measure F, which is supported by a separate coalition of dispensaries and other medical marijuana groups, was unfair because it refers to Proposition D as “a Trojan Horse” that “was slapped on the ballot at the last minute by the City Council.”

In court Wednesday, Proposition D attorney Bradley Hertz said a ballot argument in favor of a measure should explain why voters should vote for it, not why they shouldn't vote for the competition.

“If I were to ask someone, ‘Why do you like hamburgers?’ I don’t think a good answer would be: ‘Because they’re better than hot dogs,’” Hertz said.

But Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Joanne O'Donnell ruled the language should stand. “It seems logical than an argument for one ballot measure may include statements regarding the insufficiency of another,” O'Donnell wrote in an opinion.

A separate challenge brought by the backers of Measure F was also dismissed by O'Donnell. In that case, Measure F attorneys argued that the ballot argument on behalf of Proposition D was unfair because it called itself "the only measure" that will raise taxes and control and regulate dispensaries.

Measure F, which was the first to qualify for the ballot, would allow an unlimited number of dispensaries so long as operators pay taxes, keep a certain distance from schools and each other and meet other requirements.

A third marijuana dispensary measure will appear on the ballot as Initiative Ordinance E, which would allow only older pot shops to continue operating. It initially was supported by the union of dispensary workers and a group of some of the city's original dispensaries, but those groups are now backing Proposition D.

Crafted by the council, Proposition D also would allow only the oldest dispensaries to continue operating, while raising taxes on medical marijuana sales.

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Photo: Medical marijuana at a Los Angeles dispensary. Credit: Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times

L.A. Votes: Wendy Greuel faces questions on pensions, labor support

Labor support and pensions for city workers continue to be a key issue in the Los Angeles mayoral contest, as Wendy Greuel faces fresh questions about her backing from public-employee unions and her stance on a City Council vote last year to trim retirement benefits for new workers.

Greuel has long criticized rival Eric Garcetti’s City Council vote to roll back pension benefits for new hires without engaging in collective bargaining with city worker unions. Recent statements that she would push to reopen talks with labor over the decision have raised concerns among some of Greuel’s pro-business backers. The Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce on Tuesday called on Greuel, the city controller, to appear personally to explain her position.

Also on Tuesday, Greuel accepted the endorsement of the 600,00-member county Federation of Labor, a union umbrella group that fought the pension changes. The controller also backed off an earlier suggestion that she wanted a new round of negotiations over the pension cuts, saying Tuesday she simply wants to meet with labor leaders to discuss ways of avoiding a lawsuit over the matter.

FULL COVERAGE: L.A.'s race for mayor

Columnist Steve Lopez talked to voters in the San Fernando Valley who say Greuel’s labor backing is costing her support in the key, voter-rich region.

Meanwhile, Garcetti and Greuel continued to rack up new endorsements, with Garcetti earning the support of council members Paul Koretz and Paul Krekorian, and Greuel picking up the backing of Los Angeles Unified School District Board President Monica Garcia and newly elected Los Angeles Community College Trustee Mike Eng.

Garcia, who won reelection to the board this month, faces a new challenge as a majority of her board colleagues voted to limit the number of consecutive years a board member can serve as president.

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The first debate of the runoff occurs Wednesday night -- in the city attorney race. Incumbent Carmen Trutanich will face off with Mike Feuer at a downtown meeting hosted by the Italian American Lawyers Assn. and the Metropolitan News-Enterprise. Feuer on Tuesday also picked up the endorsement of the county Federation of Labor.

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Photo: Los Angeles mayoral candidate Wendy Greuel speaks to media March 6. Credit: Nick Ut / Associated Press

L.A. school board targets Garcia with term-limits vote

A narrow majority of Los Angeles Board of Education members voted Tuesday to set a limit of two consecutive years for the school board presidency. Unless the new rule is rescinded later, the decision would end the six-year run of current President Monica Garcia in July.

The board president has no greater authority than others on the seven-member panel, but runs the meetings and frequently represents the nation’s second-largest school system. Both supporters and critics have said Garcia wields an outsized influence on district policy and the use of district resources.

The school board elects its president every July to serve a one-year term.

A similar run at Garcia narrowly failed last year, but political factors outside the board room have evolved. Last year, the swing vote against term limits and to reelect Garcia came from Steve Zimmer.

Since then, however, close allies of Garcia targeted Zimmer for defeat in his recent reelection bid. Zimmer won regardless, when the teachers union and other employee groups rallied behind him. The teachers union, for its part, has been critical of Garcia. It mounted a low-budget but sharply critical campaign against her; she won reelection earlier this month.

The term-limits vote Tuesday symbolized the waning influence of L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa as his own eight-year tenure in office ends. Although the mayor has no formal authority over the board, candidates he helped elect make up a board majority. Garcia is the mayor’s closest ally on the board, and yet a member of mayor’s bloc, Richard Vladovic, defected to favor the term-limits proposal.

The motion, which was approved on a 4-3 vote, was put forward by Bennett Kayser and Marguerite Poindexter LaMotte. Supporters noted that since 1985, the board president has come from the downtown area and environs a significantly disproportionate number of times.

L.A. Votes: Greuel and Garcetti vie for endorsements and cash

As they gear up for the May 21 runoff election, Los Angeles mayoral candidates Wendy Greuel and Eric Garcetti are spending limited time on the campaign trail as they gather support and cash for the final 10 weeks of the race.

Greuel will announce what her campaign bills as a “major” endorsement on the steps of City Hall on Friday morning. Garcetti is not holding any public events on Friday, but will be headlining a fundraiser in the evening at the home of film producer James Lassiter. He also has fundraisers planned at the Los Angeles manse of billionaire Tony Pritzker on Tuesday, and one hosted by a bundler for President Obama in Chicago on Thursday.

FULL COVERAGE: L.A.'s race for mayor

Greuel is undoubtedly planning fundraisers as well, but invitations to her events have yet to pop up on the city’s Ethics Commission website.

In their few events in recent days, both candidates have underscored their pro-business credentials. Greuel touted her efforts on behalf of minority and female business owners, while Garcetti said the city needed to stop being lazy and work harder to lure international investment.

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The break from non-stop campaigning is unlikely to last long, however.

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Photo: Mayoral candidate Wendy Greuel speaks to media on March 6. Creidt: Nick Ut / Associated Press

Garcetti says L.A. is lazy about recruiting international investment

Los Angeles mayoral candidate Eric Garcetti said Wednesday that city leaders have not done enough to promote international investment here or to recruit businesses from other nations, adding that if he is elected, he would pursue those opportunities more aggressively in Latin America and Asia.

“We’ve had successful trips of mayors abroad,” Garcetti told members of the L.A. Metropolitan Hispanic Chambers of Commerce at a luncheon in Silver Lake. But “it’s like a balloon that we blow air into, as soon as we leave, it deflates. I want to have much more of a permanent presence, especially with our large trading partners in the capitals.”

He proposed opening city offices in such key destinations as Seoul to encourage trade, tourism and investment, noting that even the small state of Arkansas has an office in Shanghai.

Garcetti, a Rhodes Scholar who taught at Occidental College and USC, said the city's next mayor should be as culturally fluent as possible.

Making a subtle contrast to rival Wendy Greuel, who has spent much of her career in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., Garcetti noted that he would bring “the experience of having lived abroad, having traveled abroad and having taught international relations” to the role of mayor.

“I understand that our success is really tied to the international economy,” he said.