Council District 1 rivals have similar goals, different approaches

On a sunny Friday morning, men flitted around the MacArthur Park bathrooms like moths to a flame.

"See that activity there?" Los Angeles City Council candidate Jose Gardea said. "Drug activity. That has got to stop."

The squat building that borders Alvarado Street, Gardea says, represents the problems with the park, which has long been a stronghold of illegal activity.

Cleaning it up, which Gardea estimates could cost $18 million, would include adding police, restoring the red-flagged boathouse and putting boats back on the lake. It's one issue that council candidates are facing in the 1st District. Incumbent Ed Reyes is terming out, leaving a fight between two candidates with similar upbringings and goals but very different political histories.

Gilbert Cedillo, 58, has been in the Legislature for 15 years, representing districts that included much of downtown and some of the 1st District. He faces term limits on his Assembly seat. Gardea, 44, is Reyes' chief of staff. The men say they approach issues as their training has taught them: Cedillo through compromise and discussion, Gardea by working with neighborhoods.

Both hope to revitalize the 1st District, where job growth declined 9.6% in 2011, according to the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce, and the average wage was third-lowest in the city. Creating jobs and funding public safety are issues both candidates discuss frequently. But proposed developments in areas near downtown have sparked some of the most contention, including plans for a major residential complex in Elysian Park, as well as Wal-Mart's ongoing efforts to build a grocery in Chinatown.

"Our future hinges on who represents us," said Echo Park Neighborhood Council President Ari Bessendorf, who has fought the Elysian Park development. "The council seat can decide everything."

The 1st District cuts a diagonal swath from Pico-Union to Highland Park. It's the third-smallest council district by area and one of the poorest. Half the voting population is Latino. Nearly 15% is Asian. Cedillo and Gardea both grew up there: Cedillo in Boyle Heights, Gardea near MacArthur Park.

Gardea describes himself as an organizer who wants to continue the work he did under Reyes, including creating affordable housing, multiuse developments and business improvement districts. He wants to revitalize areas like Chinatown and Highland Park without ruining their culture or character.

"Historic preservation is economic development," Gardea said. "Gentrification doesn't have to be a bad word."

Gardea's opponents have blasted him for being weak on job creation and unfriendly to businesses. Since January, the Chamber has spent nearly $32,000 on yard signs and mailers that blame Gardea for what they say is a $13,000 wage gap between 1st District workers and the rest of the city.

The district's economic development slowed when the Community Redevelopment Agency dissolved in 2011, Gardea said. That threw into limbo proposals for affordable housing and business development in Pico-Union, Westlake and Chinatown.

Gardea blames state lawmakers for reclaiming property taxes that flowed to the CRA. Finding money for projects now will require cobbling together funding from many sources, he said. Cedillo said local lawmakers, including Reyes, were at fault because local CRAs would not share their money to fund social services for the poor.

From 1990 to 1996, Cedillo was the general manager of the Service Employees International Union. He has never held a local political position. He is sometimes called "One-Bill Gil," for his nine attempts to pass a law that would make undocumented immigrants eligible for driver's licenses.

"We are the modern-day Ellis Island," Cedillo said. In the immigration debate, he said, Los Angeles should lead by example.

A large portion of Cedillo's funding comes from labor and business organizations. Cedillo has raised $272, 533, with $254,688 more contributed from political action committees. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Gov. Jerry Brown have both endorsed Cedillo.

Gardea has raised $307,834 and has been endorsed by multiple neighborhood groups, as well as the local union for food and commercial workers. (A third candidate, businessman Jesus Rosas, has raised $2,923 — not enough to qualify for matching funds.)

Gardea and Cedillo have clashing opinions on the expansion of the 710 Freeway. Its proposed routes would narrowly miss the 1st District, but the traffic and construction would affect its residents.

"This could become reality," said Antonio Castillo, president of the Highland Park Heritage Trust. "People focusing on the issue have viewed that as a dividing line between Gardea and Cedillo."

Gardea opposes any extension. He says he doesn't trust Caltrans and calls the plans a "20th century model." Cedillo authored a state bill that blocks above-ground expansion but supports a tunnel that would connect the 10 and 210 freeways.

The Barlow Respiratory Hospital, a 101-year-old cluster of buildings in a leafy knoll of Elysian Park, has been another rallying point for community members. Facing expensive upgrades to meet earthquake building codes, the hospital plans to rezone for high-density development, sell most of the land to developers, then build a new hospital.

Bessendorf of the Echo Park council has circulated an anti-development petition with more than 2,000 signatures, Gardea's among them. Cedillo has said he opposes the current plan, which could create more than 800 units in an area the size of Echo Park Lake. But the labor federation, which has given more than $152,000 to Cedillo's campaign, according to campaign finance data, has publicly endorsed the project.

Wal-Mart already has building permits for a grocery in Chinatown that would be roughly one-fifth the size of a typical Wal-Mart discount store. The company has started remodeling a vacant storefront at Cesar Chavez and Grand avenues. Reyes proposed a temporary ban last fall on all big-box retailers in Chinatown, saying such stores could destroy the area's unique culture and history. The measure failed.

Gardea does not support the Wal-Mart and has said so publicly. Cedillo says he will find a compromise. A better solution would have been a Ralphs similar to the store in downtown Los Angeles, Cedillo said, which is friendly to labor.

In MacArthur Park, Gardea wants to pay for upgrades through a business improvement district, propositions and private investment. Cedillo plans to use his relationships with the governor, law enforcement and business organizations to make the area safer.

"If you can do things that are really difficult," Cedillo said, referencing his time in Sacramento, "you can do things that are easy."

laura.nelson@latimes.com

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Women far outnumbered by men in L.A. council races

Tina Hess says she never planned to be an L.A. City Council candidate.

But last November, when she turned her attention to local races after the presidential election, she was shocked to see not a single woman running to represent her Westside district. And in seven other council races across the city, only a handful of women were running, compared with dozens of men.

"I just saw this void," said Hess, a city prosecutor who lives in Del Rey. She decided to enter the race when she realized the city could soon be without a single woman on its 15-member lawmaking body. Mayoral candidate Jan Perry, the only woman currently serving on the council, departs on June 30 because of term limits.

Hess is one of several female candidates waging uphill battles against men who have raised considerably more money.

In the west San Fernando Valley, attorney Joyce Pearson and business owner Elizabeth Badger are in a six-person field looking to replace Councilman Dennis Zine. Pearson has raised nearly $90,000 for her campaign, according to the most recent reports. Her main opponent, Assemblyman Bob Blumenfield, collected nearly twice that amount during the same period.

In the east Valley, two women are running in a lopsided four-way race against former Assemblyman Felipe Fuentes. In the most recent fundraising reports, Fuentes had raised 10 times as much money as two of his opponents — actress and community volunteer Krystee Clark and education activist Nicole Chase.

In South Los Angeles, Ana Cubas is facing seven male candidates. In a news conference this week, she urged voters not to let the council become a male-only outpost of city government. "Do we want to go back to 1933?" she asked, pointing to a picture from that era in which no women sit at the council's horseshoe of desks.

In the mayor's race, City Controller Wendy Greuel makes frequent reference to the fact that she would be L.A.'s first female mayor. Perry, in turn, would be the first African American woman to hold the post, if elected.

But Cubas, a former aide to Councilman Jose Huizar, complained that City Hall leaders and the media haven't brought enough attention to the dwindling number of women on the council. She pointed out that local newspapers, including The Times, have failed to endorse any female candidates in next week's elections.

"I cannot believe that there wasn't a single qualified female candidate," she said.

Cubas said the current trend could have long-term consequences because the council often serves as a pipeline for other elected positions.

She has pledged, if elected, to form a women's political caucus and groom a female candidate to run to replace her. She has also promised to make gender a major focus, vowing to ensure female and male employees are paid the same for equal work.

She was joined by Rita Walters, who previously served as the councilwoman in Perry's district. In the 1990s and early 2000s, the city made great strides by electing women to the council, which at one point had five female members. The idea of a council without women in 2013, Walters said, "just pains me."

kate.linthicum@latimes.com

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Bell jurors ordered to begin anew after panelist is dismissed

After nearly five days of deliberations, jurors in the Bell corruption trial were ordered Thursday to begin anew after a member of the panel was dismissed for misconduct and replaced by an alternate.

The original juror, a white-haired woman identified only as Juror No. 3, told Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Kathleen Kennedy she had gone onto a legal website to look up jury instructions and then asked her daughter to help find a definition for the word "coercion."

Although all but one defense attorney requested that the woman stay, Kennedy said the juror needed to be removed. "She has spoken about the deliberations with her daughter, she has conducted research on the Internet, and I've repeatedly, repeatedly throughout this trial — probably hundreds of times — cautioned the jury not to do that," the judge said.

The removal came after jurors notified the judge that they were deadlocked and that continued deliberations seemed fruitless.

It was unclear how to interpret the day's events, whether the dismissed juror had been a lone holdout or an indication of a fractured jury.

The juror started to tell the judge which way she was leaning in the case, saying she had gone online "looking to see at what point can I get the harassment to stop.... How long do I have to stay in there and deliberate with them when I have made my decision that I didn't think there was —"

Kennedy cut her off before she could finish.

The woman clasped her hands over her mouth and said, "I'm sorry."

Two defense attorneys thought she was leaning toward acquittal and wanted her to stay. "I would have preferred the deadlock to a guilty verdict," said Alex Kessel, the attorney for George Mirabal, one of six former council members charged with misappropriation of public funds.

The council members are charged with inflating their salaries in what prosecutors contend was a far-reaching web of corruption in which fat paychecks were placed ahead of the needs of the city's largely immigrant, working-poor constituents.

When attorneys and defendants were summoned to the courtroom Thursday morning, they were initially told that the jury appeared to be deadlocked.

"Your honor, we have reached a point where as a jury we have fundamental disagreements and cannot reach a unanimous verdict in this case," read a note signed by two jurors, including the foreman, that was given to Kennedy.

A note from another juror alerted the judge that Juror No. 3 had consulted an outside attorney. That did not appear to be the case, but her other actions were revealed under questioning from the judge.

The same juror made a tearful request Monday to be removed from the panel because she felt others were picking on her. Kennedy told the woman that although discussions can get heated, it was important to continue deliberating.

On Thursday, however, the juror again broke into tears and said she had spoken with her daughter about "the abuse I have suffered." She said her daughter told her, "Mom, they're trying to find the weak link."

The woman said she had turned to the Internet to better understand the rules about jury deliberations and came across the word "coercion." After her daughter helped her look up the word's definition, she wrote it down on a piece of paper and brought it with her to court. When the judge asked to see the paper she went into the jury room to retrieve it.

The woman later left the courtroom in tears.

With an alternate in place, Kennedy told the panel to act as if the earlier deliberations had not taken place. The alternate had sat in the jury box during the four-week trial but did not take part in deliberations.

Former council members Luis Artiga, Victor Bello, George Cole, Oscar Hernandez, Teresa Jacobo and Mirabal are accused of drawing annual salaries of as much as $100,000 a year by serving on boards that did little work and seldom met, part of a scandal that drew national attention to the small city in 2010.

Prosecutors said that Bell's charter follows state law regarding council members' compensation. In a city the size of Bell, council members should be paid no more than $8,076 a year.

The trial began in late January, and the case went to the jury last Friday.

As the jury resumed deliberations in downtown Los Angeles, the verdict was clearly in on the streets of Bell.

One resident unfurled old protest banners and signs from the days when the pay scandal was first exposed and then called former members of an activist group that had led the charge for reform in the city.

"We're holding our breaths and waiting," Denise Rodarte, a member of the grassroots group Bell Assn. to Stop the Abuse, said in regard to a verdict.

"It's cut and dry: Local elected officials were supposed to make a certain amount of money, and they made a lot more."

corina.knoll@latimes.com

jeff.gottlieb@latimes.com

Times staff writer Ruben Vives contributed to this report.

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L.A. to ask high court to overturn ruling on homeless belongings

Citing an immediate public health threat, the city of Los Angeles will ask the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday to overturn a lower-court ruling preventing the random seizure and destruction of belongings that homeless people leave temporarily unattended on public sidewalks.

If the court takes up the matter, the case could have broad implications for cities nationwide grappling with how to keep streets clean and safe while respecting the property rights of those who live there.

Fresno faces more than 30 lawsuits arising from its efforts to clean up downtown homeless encampments. In Hawaii, activists living in a De-Occupy Honolulu encampment sought an injunction against city authorities after they allegedly seized and destroyed personal property during a raid, according to court documents.

The Supreme Court filing comes after two years of legal wrangling between Los Angeles officials and homeless advocates over a controversial campaign to clean up downtown's skid row, which has the highest concentration of homeless people in the city.

"We have an obligation to the homeless, as well as to the other residents and businesses on skid row, to ensure their health through regularly cleaning skid row's streets and sidewalks," City Atty. Trutanich said in a statement. "The current outbreak of tuberculosis among that most vulnerable population should serve as a stern reminder to us all of just who and what is at risk."

Carol Sobel, who represents the homeless plaintiffs, said the TB outbreak, which has infected nearly 80 people and killed 11, has nothing to do with the property left on the streets. She accused city officials of deliberately allowing conditions to deteriorate in order to bolster their case, saying: "They have a public health issue of their making."

The dispute began when eight homeless people accused city workers, accompanied by police, of seizing and destroying property they left unattended while they used a restroom, filled water jugs or appeared in court. The seven men and one woman had left their possessions — including identification, medications, cellphones and toiletries — in carts provided by social service groups and in some cases were prevented from retrieving them, Sobel said.

In a 2-1 decision last September, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the belongings the homeless leave on city sidewalks for a short period of time may be taken only if the possessions pose an immediate threat to public health or safety or constitute evidence of a crime. In such cases, the court said, the city may not summarily destroy the possessions and must notify the owners where they can collect them.

City attorneys question whether the 4th Amendment protection from unlawful seizures and the 14th Amendment guarantee of due process extend to people who violate a city ordinance requiring them to remove their possessions during posted cleanup times, especially when free storage is available.

They say the decision, which upheld an injunction against Los Angeles, has created a "public health disaster." Homeless people are leaving piles of possessions on the ground or in overflowing shopping carts, often covered by tarps and blankets, and sometimes with a note attached saying "not abandoned" or "mine," according to a draft of the filing reviewed by The Times.

"The presence of this unattended property makes it impossible to clean the sidewalks, leads to an accumulation of human waste and rotting food around and underneath, that in turn provides a breeding ground for vermin and bacteria," the filing said.

At the city's request, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health inspected skid row last year and cited the city for violations of county and state health codes, including an accumulation of human waste, needles, condoms and a rat infestation. The city launched a major cleanup effort, during which workers removed 278 hypodermic needles, 94 syringes, 60 razor blades, 10 knives, 11 items of other drug paraphernalia and two 5-gallon buckets of feces, according to the filing.

Homeless advocates said the effort showed how street cleaning can and should be done. Homeless residents were notified in advance, given time to remove their belongings and treated courteously, they said. Any items left behind that were not deemed a hazard were bagged, tagged and stored for 90 days.

But city officials contend that the lower-court rulings are causing a drain on municipal resources by forcing city workers to sort through unattended items for hazards, exposing their employees to unreasonable health risks and leaving the city open to the possibility of endless litigation.

Just days after a cleanup, trash and debris begin to pile up again, said Andy Bales, who heads the Union Rescue Mission on skid row.

"We never, ever had to battle that before the injunction, which has taken skid row back at least eight years to before all the improvements," he said. "It has emboldened people to leave their stuff everywhere."

Estela Lopez, executive director of the Central City East Assn., a business improvement district that runs the storage facility for the homeless, said she worries the rulings will undermine efforts to get people off the streets.

"No one's mental illness, tuberculosis or staph infection gets better lying on a public sidewalk," Lopez said. "These are human beings who are often unable to make rational decisions for themselves and they need our help. Instead, we give them options that are self destructive like you can amass and hoard your belongings on the sidewalk."

Settlement negotiations are underway. Stan Goldman, a Loyola Law School professor, said it may be a long shot to ask the Supreme Court to weigh in, given how few cases it has taken up in recent years. But he said: "History has shown that the conservatives on the Supreme Court like nothing better than reversing liberal 4th Amendment decisions out of the 9th Circuit."

andrew.blankstein@latimes.com

alexandra.zavis@latimes.com

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Wendy Greuel acquired a love of politics from working with Tom Bradley

In the early 1980s, Wendy Greuel was at a crossroads. In one direction was the family building supply company housed in a dusty North Hollywood warehouse. The other way, a career at Los Angeles City Hall in Mayor Tom Bradley's administration beckoned.

Bright, young and ambitious, Greuel had balanced duties on the high school cheerleading squad and as student body president with part-time work at Frontier Building Supply — where she kept the books, drove a forklift and answered the phone that sometimes rang for her mother's side business, the White Lace Inn.

The 17-year-old Greuel, raised a Republican, was star-struck when she first met the Democratic mayor during a youth leadership ceremony atop City Hall. "Here was this 6-foot-5 inspirational leader," she said, "and as I've jokingly said, I fell in love that day."

When Bradley handed her an award, her course was set. Over the next decade, she would join a group of young aides who drove the five-term mayor's agenda, from the inspiring run-up to the 1984 Olympic Games to the difficult rebuilding after the city's 1992 riots. Her portfolio at City Hall — homelessness, housing, child care and AIDS — took the young UCLA graduate from the conservative enclaves of the Valley into the most destitute corners of South and East L.A.

"I used to call her the mayor of hopeless causes," former Bradley Deputy Press Secretary Dee Dee Myers said. "She had all the really tough, intractable issues … and she dove in."

Now a leading contender to follow her political hero to City Hall's top office, Greuel says she learned from Bradley the skills the job demands: a tireless work ethic, an ability to glide between city factions and a relentless focus on basic city services.

"What I really learned from all of those years was that the details matter," said Greuel, whose admiration for Bradley's zeal in reporting potholes led her to style herself as the "pothole queen" when she later represented the San Fernando Valley on the City Council.

But critics contend that as Greuel, currently the city's controller, raised her political profile she shied away from the imaginative and idealistic projects that were a hallmark of her years in the Bradley administration. Councilman Richard Alarcon, who worked with Greuel in Bradley's office, said he endorsed Greuel's chief rival, Eric Garcetti, after watching her gravitate toward politically safe initiatives.

"When Wendy was with Mayor Bradley, it was all about action — all about creating projects, ideas, L.A.'s Best," Alarcon said, alluding to the acclaimed after-school program that has now expanded to more than 150 Los Angeles schools. "We were doing a lot more than filling potholes."

Greuel says Bradley inspired her "passion to fight for social justice" and to stand up for the most vulnerable. But some saw her City Council focus as tending toward the more narrow — modernizing parking meters and synchronizing traffic signals.

Councilman Bernard C. Parks, the former police chief who is supporting Greuel's rival Jan Perry, said that Bradley created the downtown skyline, rebuilt the airport and brought the Olympics to L.A.

"He had a variety of legacies — most of them were big-picture ideas," Parks said. "In Wendy's era on the council…it was more of the mechanics of dealing with transportation and potholes."

In the early years however, Greuel's drive on those social issues was unquestioned.

Olivia Mitchell, Greuel's first boss in Bradley's youth development office, described Greuel as the ultimate "go-getter." At night, Greuel volunteered to be Mitchell's driver, ferrying her boss to community gatherings, prisoner probation meetings and continuation high schools in her brown Camaro.

"She wanted to know everything I knew and the people I knew," Mitchell said. Later, colleagues would tease her about being willing to "go to the opening of an envelope," Greuel said.

Former Bradley aide Donna Bojarsky said Greuel sought out "high-value, low-glamour" assignments. She also cultivated long-term political relationships that have helped her stack up endorsements in the current race.

Fellow Bradley aide Kerman Maddox noted that she was the one staffer who went to every group's party.

"We're talking 1980s Los Angeles, a tough, gritty, racially-balkanized city," Maddox said. "We'd tease her: 'How many white girls are hanging out in South L.A? It's just you.' But that's her.... She could move from camp to camp, faction to faction, because she got along with everyone."

Greuel was tasked with developing programs to deal with the city's burgeoning homeless population, which was threatening Bradley's drive to redevelop downtown's Bunker Hill. Greuel was in the thick of the issue when tensions grew over a proliferation of urban encampments, including the much-publicized "Justiceville."

Ted Hayes, Justiceville's leader and an advocate for the homeless, recalled that he and Bradley were at sharp odds because "I ran like a buzz saw right smack dab into his plans." Greuel began showing up at the camp, wandering among the plywood and cardboard structures in her prim navy suits.

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Early news reports worried Dorner victim's father, document shows

Even as Irvine police were trying to confirm the identities of a young couple found shot to death in an Irvine parking garage early this month, the department's on-duty watch commander received a late-night call from former LAPD Capt. Randal Quan.

According to an Irvine detective's search warrant affidavit released Monday, Quan had seen an early news report of the double homicide at the condo complex at 2100 Scholarship.

Quan, the document states, was worried that his daughter, Monica, 28, who lived there, might be a victim.

Quan explained that his daughter called him every night but had not returned his calls that night.

The former police captain said his daughter and her fiance, Keith Lawrence, 27, drove a small white car, similar to the one described on the news report.

Monica Quan and Keith Lawrence, who were found dead in Lawrence's white Kia Optima, were the first known homicide victims blamed on fired LAPD Officer Christopher Dorner, whose rampage earlier this month also left two law officers dead and culminated in Dorner's suicide.

The document states that as police in Irvine walked around the car that night, they counted 14 shell casings. The woman in the car, it states, was in the passenger seat, tucked in nearly a fetal position. The man was in the driver's seat, slumped over. Police said there were numerous bullet holes through the windows on both sides.

Monica Quan was the assistant women's basketball coach at Cal State Fullerton, and Lawrence was a campus police officer at USC. The two had met at Concordia University in Irvine, where both played on the school basketball teams.

Police say Dorner was angry at the elder Quan, who had represented him in the disciplinary case that resulted in his termination from the LAPD in 2009.

In a Facebook post attributed to him, Dorner warned Quan of "deadly consequences for you and your family."

The document shows that the items seized from the home in La Palma where Dorner once lived with his mother included an iPhone, an iPad, three laptops and several hard drives. Those items, the document states, had no evidentiary value to police and have since been returned to Dorner's mother.

christopher.goffard@latimes.com

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Mahony answers questions under oath about clergy sex abuse cases

A "relatively unflappable" Cardinal Roger Mahony answered questions under oath for more than 3 1/2 hours Saturday about his handling of clergy sex abuse cases, according to the lawyer who questioned the former archbishop.

"He remained calm and seemingly collected at all times," said attorney Anthony De Marco, who represents a man suing the Los Angeles Archdiocese over abuse he alleges he suffered at the hands of a priest who visited his parish in 1987.

Mahony has been deposed many times in the past, but Saturday's session was the first time he had been asked about recently released internal church records that show he shielded abusers from law enforcement.

De Marco declined to detail the questions he asked or the answers the cardinal provided, citing a judge's protective order.

The deposition occurred just before Mahony was to board a plane for Italy to vote in the conclave that will elect the next pope. In a Twitter post Friday, Mahony wrote that it was "just a few short hours before my departure for Rome."

Church officials did not return requests for comment.

The case, set for trial in April, concerns a Mexican priest, Nicholas Aguilar Rivera. Authorities believe he molested at least 26 children during a nine-month stay in Los Angeles.

Recently released church files show Aguilar Rivera fled to Mexico after a top Mahony aide, Thomas Curry, warned him that parents were likely to go the police and that he was in "a good deal of danger." Aguilar Rivera remains a fugitive in Mexico.

The archdiocese had agreed that Mahony could be questioned for four hours about the Aguilar Rivera case and 25 other priests accused in the same period. De Marco said he did not get to ask everything he wanted and would seek additional time after the cardinal returned from the Vatican.

Past depositions of Mahony have eventually become public, and De Marco said he would follow court procedures to seek the release of a transcript of Saturday's deposition.

Meanwhile, a Catholic organization Saturday delivered a petition with thousands of signatures asking that Mahony recuse himself from the conclave in Rome.

The group, Catholics United, collected nearly 10,000 signatures making "a simple request" that the former archbishop of Los Angeles not participate in the process because of the priest abuse scandals that happened under his watch, said Chris Pumpelly, communications director for Catholics United.

The petition was delivered Saturday to St. Charles Borromeo in North Hollywood, where the cardinal resides. It was accepted by a church staff member.

After delivering the petition, organizers attended Mass at the parish to pray for healing and for the future of the church.

harriet.ryan@latimes.com

Times staff writer Rick Rojas contributed to this report.

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Oyster farm fight has many interested parties

POINT REYES NATIONAL SEASHORE — To hear Kevin Lunny tell it, he's just a little guy, draining his life's savings to stand up to a heartless federal agency bent on closing down his family's oyster farm here.

It's a compelling tale, a years-long soap opera replete with allegations of scientific misconduct and government overreach. Tea party activists have taken up his cause, citing it as an example of government quashing free enterprise and environmentalism run amok. Lunny also has the support of powerhouse conservative law firms representing him pro bono, and Cause of Action, a Washington, D.C.-based government watchdog group with ties to the conservative Koch brothers.

Others, however, don't buy his story. They say Lunny and some of his supporters have distorted what is a very simple case: The owners of the oyster farm north of San Francisco agreed 40 years ago to shut down in 2012, and Lunny is trying to break the contract.

"This thing has been hijacked by people with different agendas and manufactured narratives," said Tom Strickland, former assistant secretary of the Interior. "When someone suggests that this is 'the government versus the little guy,' I think the question should be looked at in reverse. Who is looking out for the interest of individual Americans, who is looking out for the interests of taxpayers?"

In 2005, the Lunny family bought the oyster farm in Drakes Estero, which includes the tidal area where explorer Sir Francis Drake is believed to have made landfall 430 years ago. With the purchase, the family signed on to an existing 40-year agreement with the National Park Service stating that the business would cease operations last fall and the area would convert to marine wilderness, as Congress intended.

From the beginning, Lunny made clear to the Park Service that he was interested in staying on, but Interior's solicitor ruled the agency had no legal basis to allow that.

The often-ugly debate reached a crescendo three months ago when Interior Secretary Ken Salazar elected not to extend Lunny's permit to operate in Point Reyes National Seashore. The operation is scheduled to be removed next month, clearing the way for Drakes Estero, a dramatic coastal sweep of five bays in Marin County, to become the first marine wilderness in the Lower 48 states.

Lunny filed a lawsuit to force the government to extend his lease, but it failed in federal court. He said he is appealing to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco.

"To my mind, the issue really centers on the original deal," said Lynn Scarlett, an assistant secretary of the Interior under George W. Bush. "When this area was designated as a national park unit, the Congress and all those who were engaged struck a deal. A deal's a deal."

Lunny casts the debate in different terms. He says that the government is being unfair and that his protracted fight to stay has devastated his family. U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who wrote two bills to help Lunny continue operating in the park, wrote Salazar to say that because of the oyster farm's impending closure, Lunny's family is "facing financial ruin."

The family does have other sources of income. They run a cattle ranch on federal land and own a paving and construction business. Lunny's legal fight is being waged by lawyers working for free, five of whom joined him at his last court appearance. He is soliciting online donations via the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund and has a shellfish industry lobbyist on his payroll as a consultant.

Records obtained under the Freedom of Information Act show that the federal government has extended generous subsidies to the Lunny family for decades. The extended family has leased more than 1,100 acres, where it raises cattle within the park. The grazing rate Lunny and other ranchers pay is about one-third the amount ranchers are charged on adjacent private land.

The Lunnys' lease includes a three-bedroom house, a second residence and a bunkhouse, all owned by the federal government but leased by the family. Lunny pays $2,200 a month for the 1,100 acres and the buildings — about what renters nearby pay to lease a single-family house on a small plot of private land.

The Park Service, under political pressure to help Lunny, recently spent $50,000 to replace the roofs on two of the family's leased buildings. Other federal seashore tenants are required to pay for their own home maintenance.

The Park Service, however, has made mistakes in the case that have given ammunition to the Lunnys' supporters. In 2007, a seashore scientist wrote a flawed report that suggested Lunny's farm harmed harbor seals.

The Park Service acknowledged the errors and retracted the study, but the episode gave credibility to claims that the park was using "junk science" to force Lunny out.

At Feinstein's urging, the Park Service commissioned outside reviews of its ongoing study of Drakes Estero. The effort to resolve the scientific debate has morphed into a multimillion-dollar morass of scientific studies and investigations by Interior's inspector general, the National Academy of Sciences and the Marine Mammal Commission, paid for by taxpayers.

The results: In some instances the Park Service conclusions overreached, in some instances they were correct, and most of the time it was impossible to determine the accuracy of any claim without more study.

Apart from his trouble with the park, Lunny has a history of not complying with California Coastal Commission orders. For six years, Lunny's farm has failed to acquire the appropriate state permits to operate in a coastal zone.

The Coastal Commission earlier this month issued its second cease-and-desist order to the farm. "I find that this is one of the most egregious, egregious violations that I have seen," Commissioner Esther Sanchez said in a hearing.

Now that Drakes Bay Oyster Co.'s closure looms, the farm's plight has become a cause for groups with disparate agendas. Some represent the interests of the shellfish industry, which seeks to operate in protected waters up and down the coast. Some favor more commercial activities in national parks, and others espouse virulently anti-government views.

Lunny's supporters are threatening to stage protests and even blockade the road if authorities are required to escort Lunny and his staff from the seashore.

Lunny, a genial and quiet man, said he doesn't want to be associated with "right-wing land rights and anti-government groups."

"This has spun out of control like none of us would ever have imagined," Lunny said. "Some of these groups came out of the woodwork" after Salazar decided against extending the lease. "All of a sudden we have some new friends."

julie.cart@latimes.com

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California lawmaker Rubio leaves Legislature for Chevron job

SACRAMENTO — State Sen. Michael J. Rubio, who was leading the Legislature's effort to make California's environmental laws more business-friendly, abruptly resigned from office Friday to accept a government-affairs job with Chevron Corp.

Rubio, a Democrat from Shafter, in the Central Valley, was chairman of the Senate Environmental Quality Committee and introduced bills during his two years in office that related to the oil industry in his district.

The state Fair Political Practices Commission will conduct a routine review of Rubio's move to make sure it involves no violation of the conflict-of-interest rules in California's Political Reform Act.

"We will look to see if there is something to indicate that the act was violated and, if so, we will take a look at it," said the commission's chief of enforcement, Gary Winuk.

Rubio said in an interview that he has complied with state law, and he declined to discuss the terms of his employment. He said he quit the Legislature because he had tired of the 300-mile drive from his district to the Capitol and has a special-needs daughter who requires attention.

"My family comes first," he said.

One of Rubio's bills would have clarified state codes to allow the practice of re-injecting natural gas as part of oil drilling. The 2011 measure, which stalled in a committee, was backed by the Western States Petroleum Assn., a group whose members include Chevron Corp.

In November, Rubio was among a group of legislators who went on a trip to Brazil that was paid for by the California Foundation on the Environment and the Economy, a nonprofit bankrolled by Chevron, PG&E and other firms. Sponsors sent representatives to accompany the lawmakers as they studied Brazil's low-carbon fuel standards and other issues.

In spearheading the push for streamlined environmental laws, Rubio worked closely with the Silicon Valley Leadership Group, whose members include Chevron Energy Solutions.

It is common for lawmakers to move into high-level jobs or consulting arrangements with interests that sought their help in shaping state policy. Rubio's announcement renewed complaints about the practice from watchdog groups.

Jamie Court, president of the advocacy group Consumer Watchdog, said the revolving door between the public and private sector always raises questions of whether politicians spend their time in office "auditioning for a well-paying job for the companies they are supposed to regulate."

Rubio's departure creates a third vacancy in the 40-person Senate that will temporarily put its Democrats' numbers below the supermajority they won in November.

Two Democrats had previously left for Congress, and special elections are being held in coming weeks for their seats. Both are widely expected to remain in Democratic hands, because the party has a comfortable registration advantage in those districts.

A special election will be called to fill Rubio's seat.

patrick.mcgreevy@latimes.com

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Garcetti and Greuel in duel for funds

Wendy Greuel and Eric Garcetti remain locked in a tight fundraising battle, with the front-runners in Los Angeles' mayoral contest each raising just under a half-million dollars in recent weeks and both showing ample cash reserves to wage a vigorous effort in the closing days of the primary campaign, according to disclosure reports filed with the City Ethics Commission on Thursday.

Greuel has a razor-blade edge — the city controller raised $473,582 and spent more than $1.7 million in the latest reporting period between Jan. 20 and Feb. 16. She enters the final days before the March 5 contest with nearly $1.7 million cash on hand, according to the reports.

Noting that nearly three-quarters of her recent contributions came from first-time donors and more than half were from contributors who gave $250 and under, Greuel said the figures signified the momentum behind her campaign.

"It's amazing that so many Angelenos from every corner of the city are coming together to join our grassroots campaign," Greuel said in a statement. "In this election, we can fight together to change our city. We can build a stronger economy that creates jobs, a seamless public transportation system and better schools. We can crack down on waste in government so Angelenos can get the services they deserve. Today's report shows that people across L.A. are joining together to make this vision a reality."

Greuel's main rival, City Councilman Garcetti, raised $452,819 and spent nearly $2.5 million during the same time frame, ending the filing period with $1.5 million cash on hand, according to campaign filings. He noted that with more than 10,000 donors, he leads the field in grassroots support.

"I'm proud that our campaign's momentum is growing every day as more people learn about my plans to create jobs and solve problems for L.A. residents," Garcetti said in a statement. "You can see our grassroots strength through our fundraising, our energized volunteer corps and our thriving online network."

Overall, fundraising by the mayoral candidates has topped $11 million. Greuel and Garcetti are saturating the television and radio airwaves and have started attacking one another in voters' mailboxes. They have been fairly even in their fundraising efforts for many months, allowing them both to run a robust advertising campaign. But while Garcetti spent more during the filing period, Greuel has a steep advantage in outside efforts on her behalf. Of the $1.7 million spent by independent committees, more than $1.2 million has been spent to boost her bid, largely by labor.

Voters typically only see the candidates' ads and mailers, or clips of them on the nightly news. Under the radar, the candidates are spending significant time raising the kind of money it takes to campaign in a city as sprawling as Los Angeles. On Wednesday night, Garcetti held a fundraiser at the Petersen Automotive Museum with some of the city's hottest chefs — turning out a young and stylish crowd who sampled craft beers and delicacies such as braised and crispy pork with salted oats, house mostarda and toasted broccoli. On the same night, Greuel held a fundraiser with U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) at the Beverly Hills manse of billionaire media mogul Haim Saban. But unlike Garcetti, her campaign did not allow the media to attend.

Greuel's ads have highlighted her efforts as controller to root out "waste, fraud and abuse" — claims her opponents say she has exaggerated. On Thursday, Garcetti launched two new 15-second ads featuring his endorsement by the Los Angeles Times. Those followed two introductory spots in English and Spanish. The councilman is spending more than $600,000 this week airing ads, according to a Democratic media consultant who is not working for any candidate. Greuel and the efforts on her behalf, which are not allowed to legally coordinate with her campaign, spent about $1.3 million in the same period, according to the media consultant.

Councilwoman Jan Perry, who has been waging a blistering mail campaign against Greuel, continues to lag behind. She raised nearly $68,000 in the filing period, and spent nearly $809,000, leaving her with less than a half-million dollars for the remainder of the race. Emanuel Pleitez, the former technology executive who has never held elected office, reported raising nearly $20,000 and spending nearly $194,000 during the period, leaving him with nearly $146,000 cash on hand.

Kevin James, the sole Republican in the race, has been the beneficiary of nearly $500,000 in outside spending. He has had difficulties raising money, but his campaign has claimed that the numbers were improving. They did not file a disclosure report by press time, but his campaign manager said James had raised $52,000 and had spent $181,000 during the filing period, leaving the former entertainment attorney with about $25,000 cash on hand.

seema.mehta@latimes.com

maeve.reston@latimes.com

Times staff writer Maloy Moore contributed to this report.

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Bulgari shows off Liz Taylor's gems

It isn't easy sometimes to be an ordinary person in Los Angeles, so near to and yet so far from the city's glamorous events.

You hear about the grand Oscar parties, but you will never be invited. The award ceremony may be taking place minutes from where you live, but you watch it at home, on TV, in your sweat pants — and you might as well be in Dubuque.

Rodeo Drive too can make you feel like a scrap on the cutting room floor. As you stroll the wide and immaculate sidewalks of Beverly Hills' iconic shopping street, you pass by boutiques you'd feel self-conscious walking into. In the windows are baubles and trinkets you could never in three lifetimes afford.

Which is why it is rather nice to be invited to make a private appointment at the house of Bulgari, the fine Italian jeweler that opened its doors in 1884.

Elizabeth Taylor loved Bulgari jewels. Richard Burton, whose torrid affair with her began during the filming of "Cleopatra" in Rome, accompanied her often to the flagship shop on the Via Condotti. He liked to joke that the name Bulgari was all the Italian she knew.

So it is fitting that starting Oscar week, the jeweler is celebrating the Oscar-winning star with an exhibit of eight of her most treasured Bulgari pieces.

They are heavy on diamonds and emeralds — of rare size, gleam and value.

And Bulgari knows their value well.

After Taylor's death, it reacquired some of the gems at a Christie's auction. One piece, an emerald-and-diamond brooch that also can be worn as a pendant, sold for $6,578,500 — breaking records both for sales price of an emerald and for emerald price per carat ($280,000).

That brooch, whose centerpiece is an octagonal step-cut emerald weighing 23.44 carats, was Burton's engagement present to Taylor. He followed it upon their marriage (his second, her fifth) with a matching necklace whose 16 Colombian emeralds weigh in at 60.5 carats. Bulgari bought the necklace back too, for $6,130,500.

They are in the exhibit, along with Burton's engagement ring to Taylor and a delicate brooch — given to her by husband No. 4, Eddie Fisher — whose emerald and diamond flowers were set en tremblant so that they gently fluttered as Taylor moved.

The jewels are not for sale.

On Tuesday night, actress Julianne Moore wore the Burton necklace, with pendant attached, at a gala for Bulgari's top clients. At the dinner hour, guests were escorted along a lavender-colored carpet to a nearby rooftop that had been transformed into a Roman terrace.

Those honored guests, of course, got private viewings of Taylor's jewels.

But so did Amanda Perry, a healer from West Hollywood who arrived the next morning for one of the first appointments available to the public.

Someone had emailed news of the collection to the 35-year-old Taylor fan. She walked in off the street Tuesday, when the exhibit was open only to press — and Sabina Pelli, Bulgari's glamorous executive vice president, fresh from Rome, was taking sips of San Pellegrino brought to her on a silver tray between back-to-back interviews that started at 5 a.m.

The camera crews were long gone when Perry came back Wednesday. She had the exhibit, and handsome sales associate Timothy Morzenti of Milan, entirely to herself.

In a black suit, still wearing on his left hand the black glove he dons to handle fine jewels, Morzenti whisked Perry off via a private elevator to the exhibit on the second floor. The jewels stood in vitrines mounted high off the ground. Behind them were photos and a slide show of Taylor, bejeweled.

"Which piece would you like to see first?" Morzenti asked her as a security guard stood by. "I personally love the emerald ring."

Then he proceeded at leisure to explain Bulgari-signature sugar-loaf cuts and trombino ring settings, while tossing in occasional Taylor stories.

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L.A. Community College District chancellor to resign

The chancellor of the Los Angeles Community College District announced Tuesday that he will resign his post, leaving behind a system grappling with poor graduation and transfer rates and daunting budget cuts.

Daniel LaVista made his announcement in a districtwide email in which he extolled the progress made in strengthening accountability and bringing better coordination to the nine-campus district but acknowledged the challenges that lie ahead.

"Even with a healthier FY14 budget proposed for the state's community colleges, there are no quick fixes," LaVista said, for increasing student success, addressing accreditation problems and completing the multibillion-dollar building program.

"The chancellor who leads this remarkable albeit challenging district must take the long view and make a long-term commitment, something I'm unable to do," he said in the email.

LaVista was not available for comment. In the memo, he said he would pursue "other opportunities that combine my professional and family interests." LaVista, 69, became chancellor in August 2010 and earns an annual salary of $370,000.

His resignation is effective June 30, giving the Board of Trustees time to recruit a new or interim chief, he said.

LaVista presided over the colleges as the state was mired in a severe budget crisis, with public higher education systems especially hard hit. California's 112 community colleges operate in a decentralized system of 72 districts governed by boards of trustees; those boards appoint chancellors.

The two-year colleges play a vital role in California's higher education system, training large segments of the state's workforce and typically sending large shares of students to four-year schools. But the system has strained under the pressure of nearly $1 billion in funding cuts and has seen enrollment drop by more than 500,000 students in recent years.

The colleges have struggled to move students more quickly toward graduation and transfer to other universities. Gov. Jerry Brown and others have offered proposals to prioritize enrollment, change funding policies and require orientation and counseling.

The Los Angeles district serves about 240,000 students each year but has lost about $100 million in state support since 2009 and has slashed more than 1,500 class sections. It received harsher scrutiny after a 2011 Times investigation uncovered poor planning, questionable spending and other flaws in a $6-billion campus rebuilding project. And two campuses — Harbor and Southwest — were placed on academic probation last year.

The chancellor initially rejected criticism of the building project, financed with bonds, calling the program "well-managed and effective," and dismissed Times articles as "one-sided" and "sensationalist." But he subsequently committed to reviewing construction practices.

LaVista steered a steady course, establishing a strong working relationship with his Board of Trustees and centralizing oversight of the building program, board President Steve Veres said.

"He fought to keep the institution focused on the mission and on a steady track and that's really critical when the money isn't there," Veres said. "He set us in a strong positive direction."

Veres said LaVista had recently undergone an annual performance review that was satisfactory and that the decision to leave was entirely his own.

"The board as a whole has a high regard for him and believes he's done a good job at the district," he said.

Brice Harris, chancellor of the California community colleges, said in a statement that under LaVista's leadership, the district "survived severe cutbacks forced on it by the recession, improved operations and accountability throughout the district and brought heightened focus on improving student success."

The board is scheduled to discuss the search for a new leader at its meeting Wednesday, Veres said.

Three of the seven board seats will be contested in the March 5 election. One incumbent, Nancy Pearlman, is running, while Tina Park and Kelly Candaele did not seek reelection. Veres said he will ask LaVista to help orient new board members before they take office July 1.

LaVista replaced interim Chancellor Tyree Wieder, who took over after the June 2009 departure of Chancellor Marshall Drummond. A native of upstate New York, LaVista previously served as executive director of the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia and executive director of the Illinois Board of Higher Education, as well as president of two community colleges in Illinois.

carla.rivera@latimes.com

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Restorer of vintage farm equipment could pull in big prize

TULARE — At this year's annual World Ag Expo there was a star exhibit: a young man and an old tractor.

Ryan Haas, 19, of Devine, Texas, a two-time national grand champion at the Delo Tractor Restoration competition, is at the top of a hotly contested field largely unknown to urbanites.

But in rural places that aren't color-coded blue versus red, but rather green versus orange — as in big green John Deere tractors, or smaller, sunny-colored Cases — tractor restoration is an obsession.

Youth participation in restoration competitions is growing especially fast in struggling agricultural areas. It's deep rooted in drought-plagued Texas and gaining momentum in California's Central Valley, where the dairy industry has been pummeled by high feed prices and low milk prices.

More than just a symbol of hanging on to a slipping heritage, the competition requires the skills needed in modern agriculture jobs: engineering, budgeting, marketing and social media. There is also the allure of big cash prizes at fairs and stock shows and the chance to make a profit selling a vehicle to a wealthy collector.

Haas' restored beauty, a 1970 Case tractor— its vintage "Desert Sunset" and "Flambeau Red" paint gleaming in the Central Valley sun — took two years of long nights and $12,000 to rebuild and restore.

His earliest memories are of being in a tractor. His father would go out to plow and use a wooden pallet on the floor of the tractor's cab as his son's playpen. Later on, his older sister drove her date to a prom in one of the family's tractors.

Haas was 10 when the drought first got so bad that his family mostly stopped planting wheat and sorghum. They parked their tractors and turned to cattle on land the family had farmed near Devine since 1872.

Both of Haas' older siblings competed in the national restoration competition. By the time they got to this last year of eligibility for the youngest sibling, all of their father's and grandfather's oldest, retired tractors had been restored.

The youngest Haas wanted to try to restore something with more complicated mechanics anyway. A family friend bought a ranch and found the abandoned Case with a diesel engine.

"My dad and my granddad both ran Case, so pretty much anything you needed to know, they knew," he said.

There is a strong possibility that father and son bear a striking resemblance, but it's hard to tell for sure with them both in straw western hats pulled low and Tony Haas adding a handlebar mustache and sunglasses. Sometimes in hours and hours of tearing apart and rebuilding, the two would bump heads over the best way to go about the work. How did they settle disputes?

"Well, ma'am, I reckon it was whoever gave up first," Ryan Haas said.

He is majoring in business administration at a local college and wants to open a diesel performance business — specializing, of course, in tractors.

The trade may have a promising future. Tractor-love is spreading, with experts pointing to the earth-churning behemoths as the next high-end collectible.

"Tractors are an up-and-coming trend. Many collectors remember riding in a tractor with their father or grandfather. But a lot of others just think they're cool," said Tabetha Salsbury of Hagerty Insurance, the world's largest insurer of collector vehicles. She is the only other two-time winner of the Delo competition.

In addition to the Delo, which is sponsored by Chevron's brand of oil and lubricants and is considered a Super Bowl of tractor restoration, there's also a tractor restoration Web series ("Tractor Fanatic," with episodes available in a two-DVD set) and Midwest tractor shows that draw thousands of fans each summer.

Dennis Rupert, a national tractor restoration judge, said this may be a moment in the sun for old tractors. But there are a couple of challenges: size and weight.

"You're restoring 20 tons. It's not like those TV shows where they're restoring a pedal car or a Coke machine," he said. "Still, there is something nostalgic that hits home. If it's Uncle John's tractor you oughta see the tears flow."

At the ag show, teenagers posed for photos in caps resembling pink cow udders, the smoky smell of Portuguese linguica drew long lines to a food court and folks hurried to a hay and forage seminar, but one farmer stood stock still in front of Haas' Case.

"This is the best tractor in the whole place," Don Adams, 62, said with a look of delight usually associated with a child opening a birthday present. "Sure brings back memories."

Haas hopes to sell his restored tractor for twice what he spent on it. But if he doesn't, he won't treat it like a museum piece.

"I'd rather see it running than sitting," he said. "It's a tractor."

diana.marcum@latimes.com

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Major donor to GOP helping L.A. mayoral candidate Kevin James

Dallas billionaire Harold Simmons and Los Angeles mayoral candidate Kevin James crossed paths just once.

It was an intimate cocktail fundraiser for James in the tony Montecito enclave near Santa Barbara, where Simmons owns a weekend retreat and counts Oprah Winfrey among his neighbors. Simmons, one of the top donors to Republican "super PACs" in 2012, turned to the candidate and asked, "What on Earth can you do to save L.A.?"

James, recounting the exchange, said he launched into his political pitch, railing against the city's flirtation with bankruptcy and the power of its labor unions. "I remember him telling me he was impressed," James said.

Later, when James made formal remarks to the group, which included a few of Simmons' fellow Texans, the industrial magnate stood up and announced that he would give. By mid-January, Simmons had given $600,000 to an independent group backing James, making him the largest single contributor to any political committee affiliated with the L.A. mayor's race — a sphere most often dominated by labor unions.

His contributions made it possible for a super PAC known as Better Way LA, created by GOP ad man Fred Davis, to buy half a million dollars of TV ad time last week promoting James, the only Republican in the race.

But that political help could come at a price in a city as liberal and Democratic as Los Angeles, where James needs to win over moderates, as well as conservatives, to reach a two-way runoff in May. In recent years, Simmons has funded some of the most controversial conservative groups in presidential politics, and last year he called President Obama "the most dangerous American alive."

Simmons' interest in city politics and a long shot like James remains something of a mystery. A corporate investor whose net worth was valued at $7.1 billion by Forbes last September, Simmons declined to be interviewed. He votes in Texas and has not contributed to any other Los Angeles city candidates in recent years, according to election records.

By the standards of his past political giving, Simmons' support for the pro-James super PAC has been small.

In last year's presidential race, Simmons, his wife, his companies and their employees gave $31 million to a network of super PACs that proliferated after the Supreme Court's 2010 Citizens United ruling, which loosened the reins on political spending by corporations and labor unions, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

"This is one of a handful of mega-donors in U.S. politics who has given extraordinary sums of money over many, many years," said Sheila Krumholz, the center's executive director who has monitored Simmons' political giving for two decades. "He's a savvy donor, somebody who is very familiar with how this game is played at the highest levels and on down."

James, an openly gay Republican, said he knew of no specific business that Simmons has before the city. And Simmons did not mention any particular Los Angeles issue, he said.

James suggested that Simmons, 81, may be interested in elevating a moderate Republican voice statewide. Simmons has contributed to another California moderate, former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, and told the Wall Street Journal last year that he was "probably pro-choice."

"For donors who are looking for the Republican Party to be able to plant a flag again in California," James said, "I'm the kind of Republican that's a bigger-tent Republican."

In that rare interview he granted the Wall Street Journal last year, Simmons said he wanted to make the U.S. tax and regulatory structure more friendly to business by electing Republicans at all levels of government. He said he hoped like-minded individuals would make political donations to help counter spending by labor unions.

In 2004, Simmons donated $3 million to Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, a group that ran ads accusing then-Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry of exaggerating his record in the Vietnam War. And during President Obama's first run, Simmons was the sole funder of the American Issues Project, which ran TV ads tying Obama to a founder of the Weather Underground, which planned a series of bombings to protest the Vietnam War.

In his interview with the Journal, Simmons described Obama as "a socialist" who "would eliminate free enterprise in this country."

At times, Simmons' political contributions have tracked closely with his business interests — a network of companies that include hazardous waste disposal and metal component manufacturers.

He was a generous backer of Texas Gov. Rick Perry at a time when one of those companies, Waste Control Specialists, needed the governor's backing to build a low-level radioactive waste disposal site, the nation's first such new facility in three decades.

After a fierce lobbying campaign, Perry signed a law opening the way for the proposal. Perry appointees later approved the license for the $500-million site in West Texas despite concerns of some state environmental experts about potential harm to aquifers near the site. Simmons' spokesman has said that Simmons' connections to Perry did not work to his company's advantage and in fact increased the state's scrutiny of the deal.

Krumholz said Simmons' companies span so many fields that it has been difficult to trace possible ties between his business interests and his giving even at the federal level.

"He's kind of like the AT&T of individual donors," said Krumholz, noting that the telecommunications giant has interests in defense contracting and other industries. "He might have reason to be involved at various levels of government and in specific races because his investments are so diverse."

maeve.reston@latimes.com

Molly Hennessy-Fiske contributed to this report.

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Hollywood directs its star power toward a campaign closer to home

A stylish crowd waited beneath a flashing marquee outside the Fonda Theatre. "Appearing tonight!" the sign read. "Eric Garcetti 4 Mayor."

In a city where political campaigns are typically waged at neighborhood meetings, not Hollywood concert halls, last week's star-studded fundraiser for Garcetti highlighted the entertainment industry's outsized role in this year's mayoral race. Talk show host Jimmy Kimmel started the show with a stand-up routine and musician Moby got the crowd of several hundred dancing. Actress Amy Smart urged everyone to tweet about the campaign, and actor Will Ferrell beamed in via video to pledge that if Garcetti is elected, every resident in the city will receive free waffles.

Hollywood is taking to City Hall politics like never before, veterans say, with power players such as Steven Spielberg leading a major fundraising effort and celebrities such as Salma Hayek weighing in via YouTube. A Times analysis of city Ethics Commission records found that actors, producers, directors and others in the industry have donated more than $746,000 directly to candidates, with some $462,000 going to Garcetti and $226,000 to City Controller Wendy Greuel.

Several of Greuel's big-name celebrity supporters, including Tobey Maguire, Kate Hudson and Zooey Deschanel, recently hosted a fundraiser for her at an exclusive club on the Sunset Strip. She is getting extra help from Spielberg and his former partners at DreamWorks, Jeffrey Katzenberg and David Geffen, who have given at least $150,000 and are raising more for an independent group funding a TV ad blitz on her behalf.

The burst of support is coming from an industry often maligned for paying little attention to local politics.

While Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is often photographed at red carpet events and former Mayor Tom Bradley was famously close to actor Gregory Peck, serious Hollywood money and star power has tended to remain tantalizingly out of reach for local politicians. "It's no secret that the entertainment industry has never really focused on the city that houses it," said Steve Soboroff, who ran for mayor and lost in 2001.

Political consultant Garry South, who has worked on mayoral and gubernatorial campaigns, recalled having to pay celebrities to appear at fundraisers in the past. Hollywood has long embraced candidates in presidential and congressional elections, South said, in part because they have more influence over causes favored by celebrities.

"The mayor of L.A. is not going to get us out of Afghanistan. The mayor of L.A. is not going to determine whether or not gay marriage is legal," South said. "The local issues are just not as sexy."

But this year, if you're a part of the Hollywood establishment, chances are you've gotten invitations to fundraisers for Greuel, Garcetti or both.

The difference this time is that both candidates have worked to cultivate deep Hollywood connections, observers say. Garcetti has represented Hollywood for 12 years, overseeing a development boom and presiding over ceremonies to add stars — Kimmel recently got one — on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Greuel is a former executive at DreamWorks, where she worked with the moguls who founded the studio. She has also served for 10 years on the board of the California Film Commission.

City Councilwoman Jan Perry and entertainment attorney Kevin James have reaped far less financial support from the industry, records show, although each claims a share of celebrity endorsements. Dick Van Dyke sponsored a fundraiser for Perry and Oscar winner Dustin Lance Black has given to James.

Agent Feroz Taj, who attended Garcetti's Moby concert, said a flurry of activity around the race, involving friends and colleagues, piqued his interest. He said he's never been involved in a political campaign, but now when he receives invites to Greuel events, he says he is supporting Garcetti.

Industry insiders have been buzzing about a letter they say is being circulated by an advisor to Spielberg and Katzenberg, urging people to give $15,000 to an independent group supporting Greuel. The DreamWorks founders have made a difference for Greuel in previous elections. In 2002, financial support from the studio executives and their allies helped her squeak out a victory in one of the closest City Council races in history.

This time around, billionaire media mogul Haim Saban is getting involved, providing his Beverly Hills estate for a Greuel fundraiser featuring U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.). Greuel has also received contributions from Tom Hanks and actresses Mariska Hargitay and Eva Longoria, neither of whom have given to a local political campaign before, according to records.

Garcetti, on the other hand, has picked up contributions from former Disney Chief Executive Michael Eisner, as well as newcomers to local politics Jake Gyllenhaal and Hayek, who once traveled with Garcetti on a global warming awareness mission to the South Pole. The actress released a video endorsing Garcetti and thanking him for helping her find her wallet in the snow.

Campaign consultant Sean Clegg linked the industry's burgeoning interest in mayoral politics to President Obama's election, which he said had "a catalyzing effect on Hollywood." Indeed, many Greuel and Garcetti supporters were Obama backers. Hayek hosted a fundraiser for Obama and Longoria served as a co-chair of his reelection campaign.

Clegg is a consultant for Working Californians, an independent campaign committee that hopes to raise and spend at least $2 million supporting Greuel, with donations from Spielberg and others in Hollywood, as well as the union representing Department of Water and Power employees.

Generally, Clegg argued, Hollywood money is different than the special-interest funding campaigns collect. "Money is coming out of the entertainment industry more on belief and less on the transactional considerations," he said.

But Raphael Sonenshein, director of the Pat Brown Institute of Public Affairs at Cal State L.A., said Hollywood's new interest in local elections may be tied to growing concerns about film production being lured elsewhere by tax incentives.

Garcetti and Greuel have both pledged to reverse job losses tied to runaway television and film production, with Garcetti touting a recent proposal to eliminate roughly $231,000 in annual city fees charged for pilot episodes of new TV shows. The number of pilots shot locally has dropped 30% in recent years, but city budget analysts say the tax break would have a minimal effect because city fees represent only a small portion of production costs.

On the council, both candidates voted to eliminate filming fees at most city facilities. Greuel tells audiences she has an insider's perspective on the industry's needs and says she will create an "entertainment cabinet" to help it thrive. "I have sat with studio heads," she said in a recent interview. "They want a city . . . that is a champion for film industry jobs in Los Angeles."

Greuel may have Garcetti beat on experience in the studio front office, but he is the only candidate with his own page on IMDb.com — a closely watched industry website that tracks individuals' film and television credits.

The councilman, a member of the Screen Actors Guild, has made several television appearances, including one for the cable police drama "The Closer." He played the mayor of Los Angeles.

kate.linthicum@latimes.com

Times staff writer Maloy Moore contributed to this report.

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The father of all support groups

Craig McGruder tilts his head to hear a plea for help in the heart of Watts.

"I've got trouble," says a guy who used to run with the Grape Street Crips. "Been thinking about doing some dirt. Thinking about robbing so I can get my kids the school supplies they need."

McGruder understands trouble. He'd grown up with most of the men meeting in this white-walled community center on a midsummer night. Some had been dealers who'd sold him crack when he was at his lowest, skulking around Jordan Downs, where he'd been born in 1962 and never much left.

"You can't do it," McGruder says, surprising himself because he's always tended to be quiet. "You got too much to lose. If you get caught and locked up, how can you be there for your kids?"

The ex-gangster gets an earful, from McGruder and the others, their words splitting the air like an ax. "Don't let us down." He lowers his head and agrees.

About two dozen men come every Wednesday night to these gatherings; many have lived lives full of terrible choices. They know they've brought pain to their community, one of the nation's toughest housing projects.

"This is no group of guys who've been choirboys," says one of their leaders, Mike Cummings, known simply as "Big Mike." "They take responsibility for it. And they're trying to make things right."

These men have formed a street-level support group, raw and uncensored. Their goal? Becoming what most of them didn't have while growing up: good fathers.

Their meetings, off-limits to outsiders without group approval, can feel staid at times. Then, in a flash, everything changes. Men raised to mask all feeling crack with emotion. They worry about losing their kids to violence or angry mothers or foster care. They wonder how to safeguard daughters or teach boys to become men. They talk about their mothers, and some of them cry.

McGruder stands out. Fifty, gray-haired, his round face framing a gentle smile, the men have voted him Father of the Year. He lives for these gatherings, which are led by a trio of former Crips and the only white person — and only woman — in the room, a professor of social work at UCLA whom the men have come to see as a confidant.

Each week McGruder's twin 17-year-olds, Victor and Vincent, sit shyly next to him in folding chairs. He makes them come. They need to learn.

His boys are about to have children of their own.

::

It started in 2009 on a patch of grass outside the Jordan Downs gym. A group of ex-Crips gave haircuts and grilled hamburgers, hoping families and fathers would show up, relax and begin to talk.

"Growing up the way we did, during the time we did, a lot of the dads might as well have been in some other world," says Andre "Low Down" Christian, one of the leaders. "It's a big reason why things ended up as rough as they did here."

He tells of getting into a fight and tracking down his father for advice. His father gave him brass knuckles and a sawed-off shotgun.

"There had to be a better way of looking at being a dad," he says. "That's what we wanted people to think about."

Those initial weeks in front of the gym, five people came. The local fire station donated steaks and a barbecue. Time passed. Twenty arrived. Then 25.

John King, the Los Angeles Housing Authority official who oversees the community center, was already trying to change the culture in Jordan Downs as preparations were made to rebuild the 700-unit apartment complex. He offered his support and told the men to use his conference room.

By the summer of 2011, backed by a $50,000 grant from the nonprofit Children's Institute, the loose amalgamation of men became something more formal. Now they had a name, Project Fatherhood, and were part of a regional network of meetings the institute sponsored, focusing on men and their kids.

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Deputy killed in Dorner standoff was 'fun,' 'boisterous' new dad

Jeremiah MacKay was a regular at Liam's Irish Pub in Colton.

He always had a pint of Guinness and a smile, said Yara Alves, the bar's owner. He had Irish roots, and he'd show up, guaranteed, every St. Patrick's Day wearing a kilt and bringing his bagpipe.

"He never had anything sad or negative to say," Alves said. "It was as if he never had a bad day."

Alves choked up as she spoke about MacKay, 35, a San Bernardino County sheriff's deputy who was killed in a firefight Tuesday in an isolated area near Big Bear. Police said the gunman was Christopher Dorner, a former Los Angeles Police Department officer bent on revenge over his dismissal from the agency in 2009.

A second deputy, Alex Collins, was wounded in the gunfight, San Bernardino County Sheriff John McMahon said. Collins has undergone multiple surgeries and is expected to make a full recovery.

McMahon said the deputies who responded to the cabin where Dorner barricaded himself are "absolutely true heroes."

"The rounds kept coming" from the cabin, he said, "but the deputies didn't give up."

Dorner also is believed to have killed three other people, including Riverside Police Officer Michael Crain, who was shot in his marked patrol vehicle. Crain was buried Wednesday. On Feb. 3, Monica Quan, daughter of a retired LAPD captain, and her fiance, Keith Lawrence, were found shot to death in an Irvine parking garage in what police believe were the first of Dorner's crimes.

On Thursday, authorities confirmed that the charred remains found in the burned-out cabin were Dorner's.

For days, MacKay, a 14-year veteran of the department, was involved in the massive manhunt for Dorner in the mountains around Big Bear.

"We knew he was up there," MacKay's cousin Jennifer Goehring said. "We were praying for his safety, but never in a million years would we have thought this would happen."

MacKay posted photos from the mountains on his Facebook page, joking about how he — who grew up in the San Bernardino Mountains — was one of the only officers wearing short-sleeved shirts in the snow.

On Saturday he told an Associated Press reporter that he knew the danger as he scoured the mountains for Dorner: "This one, you just never know if the guy's going to pop out or where he's going to pop out. We're hoping this comes to a close without any more casualties."

On Sunday he was pictured on the front page of The Times, his eyes squinted as he put on a hat. He posted a photo of the newspaper on Facebook, making fun of his facial expression, Alves said.

San Bernardino County Sheriff's Capt. Lee Hamblin said he was responding to the call of a gun battle when he heard "Officer down." He said his worst fear was soon confirmed when he learned MacKay had been killed.

"Although we're glad it's over," Hamblin said of the manhunt, "the price we paid was way too high."

MacKay joined the department in July 1998, Hamblin said. He worked in the jails, as a detective at the department's Big Bear station and most recently as a deputy in the department's Yucaipa station.

He was married and had a 7-year-old stepdaughter and a 4-month-old son, Goehring said. He was thrilled to be a new father. His family, she said, made him the happiest man in the world.

On Thursday, a steady stream of people stopped by a makeshift memorial outside the Yucaipa station.

Janet Lopez, 55, placed flowers and a note at the memorial. MacKay, she said, had taken a liking to her father, who suffered from renal failure. MacKay would "go over and cheer him up, get him to walk," she said.

Family, friends and co-workers described the deputy as having a big personality, a big heart and a big, loud laugh. It was difficult to be sad around him, they said.

It was MacKay's laugh that first caught Edward Knuff's attention years ago in Liam's Irish Pub.

"He was a little boisterous, always fun," Knuff said.

Knuff, a commercial photographer, said he met MacKay at the pub for a meeting of the Inland Empire Emerald Society, a nonprofit that raises money for the families of fallen law enforcement officers.

Now the organization is raising money for MacKay's family.

hailey.branson@latimes.com

adolfo.flores@latimes.com

Times staff writer Joseph Serna contributed to this report.

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L.A. tax measure could help pay for raises for city employees

At a time when taxpayers are being asked to dig deeper to resolve Los Angeles' chronic budget crisis, city employees are receiving raises that will cost tens of millions of dollars within a few years, according to records obtained by The Times.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, an assortment of City Council members and Police Chief Charlie Beck are urging voters to approve a sales tax hike on the March 5 ballot that would boost the city rate to 9.5% , one of the highest in the state.

At the same time, thousands of police officers, firefighters and civilian employees are in the midst of receiving a two-year series of raises that were backed by the mayor and council. When all the increases are in place for a full year — the fiscal year that starts July 2014 — they will add $167 million annually to the general fund budget, which pays for public safety and other basic services.

The added cost of the pay increases will equal three-fourths of the new revenue the city expects to collect if the sales tax measure passes.

Opponents of the tax increase, Proposition A, argue that city leaders gave away too much to employee unions amid the economic downturn. Voting for the measure "only encourages more bad behavior," said Jack Humphreville, a neighborhood volunteer who wrote the ballot argument against Proposition A.

"They're basically trying to bail themselves out of a problem that they made for themselves," he said.

Councilman Paul Koretz, who favors the measure, said workers made key concessions that offset the raises they are receiving. Those include furloughs, or unpaid days off, and increased contributions toward employee retirement, he said.

"When raises were given during the [budget crisis], there were also givebacks," Koretz said.

Backers of Proposition A, which needs a simple majority to pass, say it is essential to stave off deep cuts to city services. Beck has warned that 500 LAPD positions will have to be eliminated if the measure is defeated.

Miguel Santana, the city's top budget official, said salary costs this year are the same as in 2007, partly because City Hall has thousands fewer positions. Villaraigosa argues that city officials have made key changes, including a rollback in pension benefits and an increase in the retirement age for new civilian employees.

"I believe and believe strongly that we've made a lot of cuts," he said. "Eighty percent of this structural deficit has been resolved because of cuts."

Still, increased salary costs are contributing to projected budget shortfalls in coming years. Santana has warned that the budget gap will reach $216 million in July — a figure contested by one former Villaraigosa aide — followed by $327 million the year after that.

"One way or the other, we're going to have to make up that difference," Santana said. "The way we've been doing it so far is by reducing the size of the workforce. The question is, what is there left to cut?"

Thousands of civilian workers represented by the Coalition of L.A. City Unions — a group that includes custodians, trash truck drivers, landscapers and others — are in the process of receiving three scheduled raises. A 3.75% increase was given last summer. Another 1.75% raise is due July 1, followed by a 5.5% hike Jan. 1, 2014.

Animal shelter worker Jake Miller said the raises are "modest" and should have no bearing on passage of Proposition A. "We deferred our raises three times already to help the city stay solvent. But we can't do it forever," he said.

Police officers and firefighters are receiving five raises over two years. An increase of 1% was provided July 1 and another 2% given last month. Three more increases — 1% on July 1, 1% on Nov. 1 and 2% on March 1, 2014 — are on the way, records show. When the five increases are in place for a full year, they will add $92 million annually to the general fund budget.

Santana noted that sworn employees went three years without pay increases during the worst of the financial crisis.

Not yet included in any of the city's spending and deficit projections are employee raises that could be approved after March 2014, as a result of a new round of contract talks set to begin later this year.

david.zahniser@latimes.com

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