John and Ken to host debate for GOP governor candidates

By Seema Mehta

April 29, 2014, 10:38 p.m.

A mostly unknown Republican gubernatorial candidate dropped out of the race Tuesday, but the two main GOP contenders will debate next month in a 90-minute event moderated by popular talk-radio hosts.

Laguna Hills Mayor Andrew Blount cited health problems as he pulled out of the June 3 primary contest.

"Due to this, I've been unable to put together the campaign that California deserves," he wrote on a Facebook message to supporters.

Best known for his elaborate annual Christmas light display, Blount was a long-shot candidate who had single-digit support in the polls. The Republican had eschewed donations, saying, "California is not for sale and neither is this election."

Attempts to reach Blount on Tuesday were unsuccessful.

Assemblyman Tim Donnelly, the front-runner after Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown, and first-time candidate Neel Kashkari will meet at 5 p.m. May 15 at the Ayres Hotel in Anaheim, according to the radio station KFI-AM (640). John Kobylt and Ken Chiampou, hosts of the "John and Ken" show, will moderate.

The duo said they had also invited Brown. A political spokesman for the governor said he had not seen a debate invitation.

Attempts to reach Donnelly were unsuccessful.

Kashkari has raised much more money than Donnelly and rolled out high-profile endorsements by Republican leaders, including a nod from former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush on Tuesday, but he remains unknown to most voters.

seema.mehta@latimes.com

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L.A., Central Valley have worst air quality, American Lung Assn. says

Los Angeles has again topped a list of the cities with the worst smog in the nation, violating federal health standards for ozone an average of 122 days a year.

The annual air pollution rankings, being released Wednesday by the American Lung Assn., were dominated by the Los Angeles Basin and California's Central Valley, which despite vast improvements over the last few decades still have the nation's highest levels of ozone and fine particle pollution.

"Air pollution is not just a nuisance or the haze we see on the horizon; it's literally putting our health in danger," said Bonnie Holmes-Gen, senior policy director of the American Lung Assn. in California. "We've come a long way, but the status quo is not acceptable."

The report evaluated metropolitan areas based on recorded levels of ozone, the main ingredient in smog, and conducted a separate analysis of fine particles — or soot — the microscopic pollutants that tend to build up in colder, winter months.

The Los Angeles region ranked fourth among metropolitan areas nationwide for short-term spikes in fine particle pollution, coming in behind Fresno, Visalia and Bakersfield. The L.A. Basin tied for third with Bakersfield for annual fine particle concentrations.

The nonprofit advocacy group's "State of the Air" report derives its rankings from publicly reported measurements of ozone and fine particle pollution from official monitoring sites. Analysts used data from 2010, 2011 and 2012 and averaged the number of bad air days. They also assigned A through F grades to counties.

The nation's air is far cleaner than decades ago because of stricter emissions standards for coal-fired power plants, vehicles and diesel engines, the report notes. Even as population grows, emissions of the most widespread air pollutants continue to drop.

Greater Los Angeles has reduced ozone levels by more than one-third in the last 15 years, the Lung Assn. says, while fine particle pollution has dropped by half over the same period.

Still, over 147 million people — about 47% of the nation — live in counties with unhealthy air, according to the report. Nearly 30 million of them are in California, where 77% of the population lives in counties with failing grades.

Climate change could make progress on air quality more difficult as an increasing number of hot, sunny days favor the formation of ozone, the Lung Assn. says.

Ozone is a gas generated when pollution from vehicle tailpipes, power plants and factories bakes in sunlight. Ozone inflames the lungs, aggravates asthma and other respiratory illnesses and is especially harmful to children. Fine particulate matter from diesel exhaust, wood smoke and other emissions lodges deep in the lungs and is tied to cancer, heart and lung disease and many other health problems.

The assessment comes as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is considering a stricter nationwide smog standard as part of a review required every five years under the Clean Air Act. The current standard, set in 2008 by the George W. Bush administration, limits permissible ozone concentrations to 75 parts per billion over an 8-hour period.

In 2011, President Obama went against the recommendations of the EPA and a panel of scientific advisers to reject a proposal to lower the standard to between 60 and 70 parts per billion. By this summer a scientific panel is expected to again recommend tightening the limit to provide greater public health protections.

Holmes-Gen said the Lung Assn. and environmental groups sued the Obama administration to force it to move forward with new smog limits and urged the EPA to "strengthen this important public health standard."

tony.barboza@latimes.com

Twitter: @tony.barboza

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Eleven hurt in blast at La Habra chrome polishing plant

A fiery explosion at a chrome polishing business in La Habra injured 11 workers, leaving two critically burned, authorities said.

The fire at Gorilla's Polishing Corp. was reported about 9:50 a.m., said Keith Mora, inspector with the Los Angeles County Fire Department, which covers La Habra under a contract. The fire was knocked down at 10:26 a.m. with about 50 firefighters at the scene.

Firefighters arriving at the business found the building engulfed in flames and smoke, with workers fleeing the blaze, Mora said.

Fire investigators believe an accumulation of dust and lint in a duct system may have caused the explosion and fire, said Inspector Scott Miller.

A group of Gorilla's Polishing workers sat away from the building after the blast, wiping at their smudged faces.

Employees at Stop Look Sign Co. were in a meeting less than a half-mile away when the explosion thundered, rattling their business and halting their conference.

Initially they thought it was an earthquake, the area having experienced one a few weeks ago, said owner Mike Dougherty.

"It just sounded like a big explosion," Dougherty said. "Our second thought was that was a sonic boom, kind of like a concussion."

In 2011, the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health found seven violations at the business, including failing to monitor for airborne contaminants, to establish an injury and illness prevention program and to provide information to employees about hazardous substances.

Gorilla's Polishing Corp. had the case closed in January 2013 after paying $1,975 in a formal settlement.

adolfo.flores@latimes.com

Twitter: @AdolfoFlores3

Times staff photographer Don Bartletti contributed to this report.

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Donald Sterling has options to weigh after NBA ban

Donald Sterling has been shamed, fined $2.5 million and banned for life by the NBA for his incendiary remarks about race.

But none of that changes the fact that Sterling still owns the Los Angeles Clippers, which gives him options.

"This may set up nicely for him," said David Carter, executive director of USC's Sports Business Institute. "He could ride off into the sunset a la Frank McCourt."

Much like the former Dodgers owner, Sterling might be forced to sell his franchise at an opportune moment, shortly before the NBA renegotiates its lucrative national television contract. An auction-like frenzy could drive the price toward $1 billion.

Or the historically litigious Sterling might turn his back on that staggering profit, choosing to stand and fight.

"If he truly doesn't want to sell, I'm going to guess he could tie this up for the rest of his life," said Richard Sheehan, author of "Keeping Score: The Economics of Big-Time Sports." "It would be an absolute disaster."

Attempts to reach Sterling for comment Tuesday were unsuccessful, so his immediate plans remained unclear.

Shortly before NBA Commissioner Adam Silver announced the league's punitive actions, however, Fox News contributor Jim Gray reported that Sterling had told him he would not sell.

His resolve might waver if, in coming days, at least three-quarters of the league's owners vote to oust him. And if more sponsors follow CarMax and State Farm in severing relations with the team.

"Something dealing with race, you don't recover fully," said David E. Johnson, chief executive of Strategic Vision, an Atlanta branding agency. "As long as he is the owner, the Clippers will never get past that."

Sterling's decades-long climb into the ranks of L.A. billionaires began during the Depression in Chicago, where he was born Donald Tokowitz to an immigrant family that moved to Boyle Heights when he was young.

After working his way through law school — and changing his last name to Sterling — he spent years as a divorce and personal injury attorney before purchasing a Beverly Hills apartment building and launching a more lucrative second career.

By the late 1990s, Sterling had built one of the largest real estate empires in Southern California. He purchased the Clippers in 1981 for $12.5 million and moved them from San Diego to Los Angeles three years later.

Though the team struggled to win for many seasons, the NBA's rising popularity helped boost Sterling's personal fortune, which Forbes recently estimated at $1.9 billion.

Last year, the Sacramento Kings were sold for $535 million. The impending sale of the Milwaukee Bucks is expected to bring $550 million.

Sports business executives say a major-market franchise should be worth significantly more. In addition to the league TV contract, the Clippers can seek a new local deal after the 2015-16 season.

"The timing is right now because the Clippers are ascending and the Lakers are on the descent," said Sheehan, the author who also teaches sports economics at the University of Notre Dame. "Instead of the Lakers being 'Showtime,' the Clippers are 'Showtime.'"

NBA owners have some precedent for forcing Sterling out. Through the 1990s, Major League Baseball twice punished Cincinnati Reds owner Marge Schott for racist and inappropriate comments.

Fellow owners reportedly worked behind the scenes, persuading Schott to sell her stake in the team.

Even if the NBA board of governors gets its three-quarters vote, Sterling might not go quietly — his history of legal ferocity extends far beyond that early career as a lawyer.

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Stiviano 'devastated' that tapes were released, attorney says

She was never his mistress, had nothing to do with the infamous tape becoming public and feels terrible about the lifetime ban the NBA imposed on Donald Sterling.

Those were the assertions made Tuesday by a lawyer for V. Stiviano, the woman who recorded the rants that led to Sterling's banishment from professional basketball.

"She was very saddened by the news. She never wanted any harm to Donald," Calabasas lawyer Mac Nehoray told The Times.

He said the 31-year-old who often sat courtside with Sterling at Clippers games is still reeling from the release of the recording in which Sterling chastises her for associating with African Americans, including Magic Johnson.

She recorded the conversation, Nehoray said, but had no role in providing the damaging tape to TMZ, the website that first broke the story. The conversation occurred at her home in September in the presence of another person and Sterling knew he was being recorded, Nehoray said. He declined to state the purpose of the recording, but said it was "by mutual agreement."

"My client is devastated that this got out," he said. He said he and his client "have an idea" of who released it, but he declined to identify that person.

"Someone released it for money," he said.

He also insisted that Stiviano and the 80-year-old team owner never had a sexual or romantic relationship and descriptions of her as his mistress in the media and in a lawsuit filed by Sterling's wife are erroneous.

"It's nothing like it's been portrayed," Nehoray said. "She's not the type of person everyone says."

Rochelle Sterling, who has been married to Donald Sterling for more than 50 years, filed suit against Stiviano in March in an effort to reclaim a $1.8-million apartment, luxury autos and cash he gave her. The suit asserted that Stiviano struck up a sexual relationship with the Beverly Hills billionaire after they met at the 2010 Super Bowl. He was the latest in a string of rich men she had seduced, the suit contends.

Nehoray said those claims were false.

"She had no association with any rich people before this," he said.

Her lawyer said his client was a hard-working young woman who supported herself waitressing and volunteered helping crime victims before signing on to work as an archivist for Sterling, but he did not elaborate on what that meant. Stiviano also helped Sterling manage his charities, a job her attorney said she greatly enjoyed and now misses.

Nehoray said Sterling's wife was friendly with Stiviano and was aware that he had purchased an apartment for her.

Rochelle Sterling's attorneys did not return calls and emails for comments.

A spokesman for the Los Angeles County district attorney's office confirmed that Stiviano did clerical work and helped explain legal procedures to victims as a volunteer in the agency's Victim-Witness Assistance Program in 2010 and 2011.

harriet.ryan@latimes.com

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Clippers owner Donald Sterling gets lifetime NBA ban

Taking actions with little precedent in American professional sports history, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver on Tuesday banned Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling from the basketball league for life and said he would push hard to get other NBA owners to force Sterling to sell his franchise.

The sanctions for what the commissioner called Sterling's "deeply offensive and harmful" language about African Americans could mean the end of the Clippers' owner's tumultuous 33-year reign over one of big league sports' most inept teams just as it appears poised for championship-caliber play.

The lifetime ban, along with a $2.5-million fine, came less than four days after audio recordings released by two websites unleashed waves of anger and disdain for Sterling. The recordings captured the 80-year-old Clippers' owner telling a female friend he did not want to see her at Clippers games with black people. The NBA said its investigation confirmed that it was Sterling's voice on the recording before the league imposed its harshest penalty ever.

Silver said the remarks were "contrary to the principles of inclusion and respect that form the foundation of our diverse, multicultural and multiethnic league." About three-quarters of the league's 400 players are black. Silver's swift and forceful response to the biggest crisis facing the NBA in memory gained wide praise within and outside the NBA.

Sterling, though, remained mostly silent and out of public view. Shortly before Silver spelled out his sanctions, Fox News contributor Jim Gray said he had spoken to Sterling, who said he had no idea what punishment would be meted out. Gray said Sterling told him, "The team is not for sale."

Sterling, a lawyer, apartment magnate and the longest tenured owner in the NBA, has a reputation for combativeness. He spent years fighting the NBA when the league tried to prevent him from moving the San Diego Clippers to Los Angeles.

"He's obviously very litigious and he's cantankerous," said Andrew Zimbalist, a professor of sports economics at Smith College. "It's very hard to predict what he would do."

After posting losing records in 30 of their 36 seasons in San Diego and Los Angeles, the Clippers have a chance in this postseason to advance beyond the first round of the playoffs for just the third time in team history. Clippers Coach Doc Rivers said the commissioner's pronouncement represented the "sigh of relief" that the team needed to refocus in time for Tuesday night's playoff game against the Golden State Warriors.

Outside Staples Center on Tuesday night, Clippers' fans showed solidarity with their team and distaste for its longtime owner. Many wore black shirts or armbands. Others turned their team jerseys inside-out, as Clippers players had done with their warm-up shirts two days earlier.

A Diamond Bar couple held signs that read: ""Dear NBA owners, Must have new owner! VOTE FOR SALE!" About 100 protesters outside the arena on Figueroa Street chanted: "Hey! Hey! Ho! Ho! Donald Sterling has got to go!"

The Clippers' owner had been condemned by President Obama, L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti and top figures from the NBA's past and present. On Tuesday, Sterling's own management team distanced itself from the owner, posting a "WE ARE ONE" message on the team's Internet site.

"As an organization, we wanted to make a stand, apart from Sterling's comments," said Seth Burton, the team's vice president of communications. "As players, coaches and an organization, we don't agree with those comments."

Silver pledged to do "everything in my power" to get Sterling to sell. The commissioner will need the backing of three-quarters of team owners. A league spokesman said a date for a vote had not been set.

Without specifying how many owners he had queried about the move, Silver declared Tuesday: "I fully expect to get the support I need from the other NBA owners to remove him."

Those who spoke out immediately after Silver's announcement signaled their approval, including owners of the Los Angeles Lakers, Indiana Pacers, Phoenix Suns, Atlanta Hawks, New Orleans Pelicans, Orlando Magic, Chicago Bulls and Dallas Mavericks.

Jeanie Buss, governor of a Lakers franchise that long overshadowed the Clippers in L.A., called Silver's action "decisive, firm and compelling." Magic Chairman Dan DeVos said, "We are wholeheartedly behind Adam's recommendation and plan to vote accordingly."

From Monday to Tuesday, Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban reversed himself, first saying harsh punishment for inappropriate statements could be a "slippery slope" that would harm other owners in the future, then tweeting that he agreed "100%" with Silver's actions.

Roger Mason Jr., a vice president of the players' association, said players would keep the pressure on. "We want immediate action and a timetable from the owners of when this vote is going to happen," Mason said.

He said players had been prepared to boycott playoff games if Silver did not impose tough sanctions against Sterling. But in a news conference outside Los Angeles City Hall, current and former NBA stars expressed gratitude for what Lakers guard Steve Nash called "quick, unequivocal and decisive" action. Lakers' legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar hailed "a new day" in Los Angeles sports. Magic Johnson praised Silver for "great leadership." (Sterling's anger, and the resulting audio recording, apparently stemmed from a decision by his friend, V. Stiviano, to post a photo on social media that she took of herself with Johnson.)

Although ultimate control of the Clippers remained in flux, Silver said the lifetime ban took effect immediately. Sterling is barred from NBA games or practices. He is not allowed to enter Clippers facilities or to participate in any business or player personnel decisions. He is also banned from the NBA's board of governors meetings and league activities.

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State begins early releases of nonviolent prisoners

SACRAMENTO — The state is releasing some low-level, nonviolent prisoners early as Gov. Jerry Brown complies with a federal court order to reduce crowding in its lockups — a turning point in the governor's efforts to resolve the issue.

Inmates serving time for certain nonviolent crimes are being discharged days or weeks before they were scheduled to go free, a move that Brown had long resisted but proposed in January and was subsequently ordered by judges to carry out.

Eventually, such prisoners, who are earning time off their sentences with good behavior or rehabilitation efforts, will be able to leave months or even years earlier.

Prison workers, inmates' lawyers and county probation officials said the releases began two weeks ago. Since then, San Bernardino County probation officers said, the number of felons arriving from prison has increased more than two dozen a week, or 30%.

L.A. County Deputy Probation Chief Reaver Bingham said he did not know how many prisoners had been released early to his jurisdiction.

Corrections officials confirmed that some inmates are being released "slightly earlier" but would not say how many or discuss the criteria used to determine who is eligible.

Officials are still working on the terms of other planned steps to reduce crowding, including making more inmates eligible for medical parole and a new release program for those older than 60.

In addition, some second-time offenders who have served half their sentences under the state's three-strikes law could be eligible to leave.

Brown's administration has estimated that 780 inmates could be released under those programs.

Sentence reductions were among the changes Brown offered to make as he sought two more years to reduce prison crowding to a level the judges deem safe. He wants to meet the jurists' targets mostly by placing more felons in privately owned prisons and other facilities.

In February, the judges granted Brown's request and ordered him to "immediately implement" the early releases and add parole options for prisoners who are frail, elderly or serving extended sentences for specific kinds of nonviolent crimes.

Analysts in Brown's administration initially estimated that about 1,400 prisoners would be freed early over two years by being allowed to shave off as much as a third of their sentences with good behavior.

From prison, they follow the normal path to either state parole or county supervision, depending on the crimes they committed.

"Our first 'Whew!' moment was when we realized it was not anybody we wouldn't [be getting] already," said Karen Pank, a lobbyist for California's 58 county probation departments.

More than 17,000 prisoners overall are potentially eligible for reduced sentences, according to the administration's analysis.

Pank said the administration was negotiating with counties over whether to pay them additional money to supervise those who are sent to probation early.

Eligibility rules for the court-ordered parole programs have not been made public. A Board of Parole Hearings meeting on the matter was held last week behind closed doors, according to an agenda posted online by the board.

Ordinarily, such major changes to the state's criminal justice system would be debated before the Legislature, but the federal judges have set aside those requirements.

"We don't have many options to weigh in on the consequences of what is being put in place," Pank said.

If California misses any of the court's interim deadlines for easing crowding, a court-appointed officer has authority to order additional releases.

State lawyers said in an April 15 court filing that officials have already met the court's June 30 benchmark, its first since the judges gave Brown extra time.

The judges set a limit on the inmate population of 143% of the prisons' capacity; the state's attorneys said the latest population was 141%.

Lawyers for prisoners argued in a court motion last week that the state was counting empty beds in a medical prison in calculating its capacity to house inmates, permitting other prisons to remain crowded. The corrections department contends the medical space should be included.

The latest prison population reports from the government show a women's prison in Chowchilla is at 183% of its capacity. Corrections officials have confirmed an inmate lawyer's report that as many as eight women at a time share dorm rooms that have a single toilet, sink and shower.

"There is one person on top of another.... It is a pressure cooker simmering," said attorney Rebekah Evenson of the Prison Law Office, which represents inmates in class-action litigation over prison conditions.

Corrections spokeswoman Krissi Khokhobashvili said crowding in women's prisons will ease when a private lockup in McFarland opens to take 520 female inmates.

In a conference call Tuesday with financial analysts, executives of the company that owns the McFarland facility said it would not be ready to take the first 260 women until the fall.

They said state officials had not yet requested the remaining 260 beds.

paige.stjohn@latimes.com

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Alex Caputo-Pearl wins runoff to lead L.A. teachers union

Alex Caputo-Pearl was a young, activist teacher when he helped lead the Bus Riders Union, co-founded a group to organize against the growing influence of standardized testing and helped start a bloc within the union to push for liberal-leaning issues.

Strikingly little has changed about the veteran social studies instructor, what he's fighting for, and how he intends to go about it.

Except now he is taking that mission to the top job of the teachers union for the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation's second-largest school system.

Caputo-Pearl, 45, won a resounding victory Tuesday, winning 80% of the United Teachers Los Angeles vote in a runoff against one-term incumbent President Warren Fletcher. In the mail-in election, 7,235 members cast ballots, fewer than one in four of those eligible to vote.

The incoming leader vowed to make the union a force for advancing education reforms favored by teachers in the school district.

"I've always walked the walk on this," said Caputo-Pearl. "The union needs to be a real leader in taking control of school improvement and really working with members and the community around how to improve schools."

Caputo-Pearl and Fletcher differ little on education policy.

Fletcher, too, has criticized standardized testing. Also, both are opposed to evaluating teachers based in part on their students' test scores. And both criticize the overall direction of schools Supt. John Deasy.

Both have made limited headway.

Fletcher spent his three-year term on the defensive — working to limit layoffs and salary cuts while trying to block aggressive moves by Deasy, who overhauled teacher evaluations to include test scores. Deasy also has tried, less successfully so far, to limit teacher job protections in the name of improving the workforce.

Caputo-Pearl was on the receiving end of one Deasy strategy: replacing the staff at low-performing schools.

Caputo-Pearl lost his job at Crenshaw High, after devoting his career to the campus and surrounding neighborhood. This year, he taught at Frida Kahlo High School.

His tenure at Crenshaw offers some insight into his leadership.

Students appreciated him as a strong teacher who motivated many into social activism. Several times, Caputo-Pearl outmaneuvered district officials, as when he helped students, parents and teachers fight off attempts to bring a charter school to the campus. (Charters are independently run public schools; most are nonunion.)

Caputo-Pearl was most proud, in recent years, of helping develop a homegrown improvement plan that won support from foundations and USC. Rather than replacing teachers, the faculty committed to improving skills and collaborating, while also working with students to make key decisions and incorporate an understanding and celebration of students' cultures.

But Deasy concluded that the approach failed to raise achievement. Caputo-Pearl countered that district decisions perpetually undermined efforts.

Another issue has arisen between them: Deasy said recently that Caputo-Pearl faces possible discipline for campaigning during school hours.

Caputo-Pearl said he'll look beyond these conflicts to work with the superintendent.

And, Deasy said Tuesday that he called to congratulate Caputo-Pearl. "I look forward to a positive and collaborative working relationship," the superintendent said.

The new leader's battle scars are a selling point for many teachers.

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Seal Beach hair salon massacre suspect to plead guilty to 8 slayings

The man accused of gunning down eight people at a Seal Beach hair salon in 2011 will plead guilty to eight counts of special circumstances murder and one count of attempted murder, his lawyer said Monday.

Scott Dekraai, who, according to prosecutors, was seeking revenge on his ex-wife when he opened fire at the Salon Meritage, has "felt for a while that he really needs to give at least the victims the sense that he's not seeking to have this go on forever," said his lawyer, Assistant Public Defender Scott Sanders.

"He thinks he owes to them at least the knowledge that he's willing to accept responsibility."

There is substantial evidence in the Oct. 12, 2011, shooting: Dekraai was arrested after he was driving away from the scene and soon confessed to investigators, according to court records. Dekraai had been involved in a custody dispute with his ex-wife, Michelle Fournier, who worked at the salon and was one of those killed, prosecutors said.

He still faces what will probably be a long trial to determine whether he receives the death penalty or life in prison without the possibility of parole. California defendants cannot use a plea agreement to accept death.

Dekraai had previously offered to plead guilty in exchange for a sentence of life in prison without parole, but that offer was rejected by the Orange County district attorney's office because prosecutors refused to drop the death penalty. The guilt portion of his trial is set to begin June 9.

The intended plea does not involve a negotiated agreement for leniency, and prosecutors said little had changed as a result of it.

"The battle in this case has always been the penalty phase," said Senior Deputy Dist. Atty. Scott Simmons.

Dekraai's trial, which like many death penalty cases has been slow to start, has been delayed even longer as the court examines defense allegations of the improper use of jailhouse informants in this case and others.

Since mid-March, the court has heard testimony from prosecutors, law enforcement and informants as it examines whether jailhouse informants were, as the defense says, repeatedly deployed in violation of the constitutional rights of Dekraai and other defendants, and information routinely kept from defense attorneys.

During the hearing, the head of the district attorney's homicide unit acknowledged that evidence has not been disclosed in certain cases, a revelation that could lead to new trials for some convicted criminals. Last week, prosecutors said they would no longer seek to introduce recordings of Dekraai speaking to informant Fernando Perez, which they hoped would help prove that Dekraai deserves the death penalty.

Orange County Superior Court Judge Thomas Goethals said Monday that Dekraai's plea does not resolve the motions filed as a result those allegations, and he indicated that he will continue hearing testimony on the informant issues.

Paul Caouette, whose father David was shot and killed in the parking lot outside the salon, said he had mixed feelings about Dekraai's decision to plead guilty.

"I don't know if it's any resolution," he said. "I think accepting his guilt, that's a good thing; but in my opinion, he deserves the death penalty."

Like many of the victims' families, Caouette has spent much of the last 2 1/2 years attending hearings as the case winds its way through the court system. He said he would continue to do so through the death penalty trial.

"I'll be here as much as I can," Caouette said.

Bethany Webb, whose sister was killed and mother was wounded in the shooting, said she does not believe in the death penalty. But she said Dekraai has not earned any sympathy for agreeing to the plea.

"He's not doing this because he's a good guy," she said. "This is just something his attorney is doing so he can go into that courtroom and say, 'Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, [Dekraai] did this because he felt bad for the families.' But he's not doing it because of that.

"He saunters in that courtroom and smiles at us," she added.

Dekraai is expected to enter a formal plea Friday.

paloma.esquivel@latimes.com

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Yurok tribe works to protect a raptor it reveres: California condor

SAN FRANCISCO — The Yurok name for the bird that soared closest to the creator and could deliver the people's prayers is "prey-go-neesh."

The English name for the Pleistocene-era throwback with the 91/2-foot wingspan is California condor, and by 1982 there were just 22 left.

Now, California's largest tribe has come closer to reuniting with the raptor whose feathers grace its sacred regalia, while working to revive the species.

An agreement signed by the tribe last month with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Park Service, the California Department of Parks and Recreation and the Ventana Wildlife Society begins a process that could make Yurok ancestral land California's northernmost condor release site.

The deal resulted from the tribe's extensive evaluation of habitat and likely food supply — carcasses of marine mammals, downed livestock and bullet-scarred game left behind by hunters.

"This is the culmination of five years of work ... but our journey is continuing," said wildlife biologist Chris West, who directs the condor program for the Yurok tribe.

West said California and Oregon wildlife agencies as well as private landowners will most likely join the effort as it moves forward.

Though the memorandum of understanding does not guarantee future release of the birds, it marks the first potential expansion of the California Condor Recovery Program in more than a decade.

"We want to help," said Kelly Sorenson, executive director of the Ventana Wildlife Society, which began releasing captive-bred condors on the Big Sur coast 17 years ago. "We have a lot of faith in the Yurok tribe."

When Europeans arrived in North America, the raptors' range stretched from British Columbia south to Baja California and into Arizona and Nevada. By 1900, it had shrunk to Southern California. Habitat loss, a decimated food supply, poisoning and power lines were among the causes.

Remaining condors were captured and placed in captive breeding programs in 1987. Releases began five years later, first in Ventura and Kern counties, then the Big Sur coast and what is now Pinnacles National Park. They are also being released in Arizona and Baja.

The results: Today there are 407 condors alive, including 128 in the wild in California, said Sorenson.

Yurok land in Del Norte and Humboldt counties offers an "excellent" area for release because of lower contaminant levels in the region's marine mammals, among other reasons, he said.

West's team has also been working to educate hunters about the dangers of lead ammunition — the single largest cause of condor death in the wild — and persuade them to switch to non-lead options. (A California law that bans lead bullets takes effect in five years.)

Biologist Tiana Williams, a tribal member and Harvard graduate who works with West, has been striving for condor reintroduction since 2003.

Regalia for the Jump Dance and White Deerskin Dance — world renewal ceremonies — rely on condor feathers taken as "gifts" from unharmed birds.

Though the tribe has made strides in acquiring federal permits for feathers, she said, "we need to have condors back up here living, as the creator has intended, interacting with us and us with them."

lee.romney@latimes.com

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Three prominent Republicans endorse Neel Kashkari for governor

GOP gubernatorial candidate Neel Kashkari announced Monday that he had been endorsed by three prominent members of his party: 2012 presidential nominee Mitt Romney, former California Gov. Pete Wilson and Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista).

Romney said he was backing Kashkari because the former U.S. Treasury official understands how to create jobs and fix schools.

"Democrats' big-government policies have hurt the middle class and reduced opportunity for Americans across the country, and that's the reason it's so important to elect leaders like Neel Kashkari, who understand how to jump-start the private sector, fix our schools and get people working again," Romney said in a statement.

"Republicans in California and across the nation must unite behind candidates who will fight for our party's principles of fiscal responsibility and hard work — and I believe Neel is that candidate," the statement said.

It is unclear whether endorsements will sway voters in the June 3 primary election. But they could help if the endorsers, notably Romney, open up their donor networks to Kashkari, who is trailing well behind GOP state Assemblyman Tim Donnelly in public opinion polls.

The two are competing to capture one of the two top spots in the June 3 primary election to take on Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown in the fall. Brown holds a commanding lead overall.

Donnelly (R-Twin Peaks) said he wasn't worried by his opponent's endorsements. They represent the party establishment "circling the wagons and trying to protect their power," the lawmaker said.

"The vast majority of Republicans do not want to be represented by somebody that voted for Obama, who ran TARP instead of a business," Donnelly continued, referring to Kashkari, who cast a vote for Obama in 2008 and ran the taxpayer-funded bank bailout. "I've been endorsed by central committees, activists and respected ‎groups up and down the state."

A spokesman for Brown poked fun at the endorsement by Romney, who lost California to President Obama by 23 points in 2012.

"I can't imagine a single California voter looking at their ‎ballot and saying, 'WWMD — what would Mitt do?' " said the spokesman, Dan Newman.

seema.mehta@latimes.com

melanie.mason@latimes.com

Mehta reported from Los Angeles and Mason from Sacramento.

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California's high school graduation rate passes 80% for first time

For the first time in California history, the high school graduation rate has surpassed 80%, mirroring a trend nationwide, officials announced Monday.

Although disparities remain based on students' race, socioeconomic status and English skills, the graduation rates for Latino and African American students are increasing more rapidly than those of their white and Asian peers.

That improvement in last year's graduation rate suggests that the state is succeeding in narrowing its academic achievement gap among racial groups, California education officials said.

Nationwide, the overall graduation rate climbed from 73% in 2006 to 81% in 2012, according to the National Center for Education Statistics at the U.S. Department of Education.

If that rapid improvement continues, the overall national rate could surpass 90% by 2020, officials said.

The graduation rates were lower for Latino and black students across the country: 76% and 68%, respectively, graduated in 2012. The percentages were roughly the same in California, based on data from 2013.

"We have to be honest that this is a matter of equity and that we have to change the opportunity equation," said Education Secretary Arne Duncan. "All of America's children are our children."

In Los Angeles Unified, the nation's second-largest school system, the overall graduation rate was 67.9% — an increase of 1.3 percentage points from 2012. For Latinos, the improvement was 1.2 percentage points to 67.2%. For African Americans, it was higher — 2.8 percentage points to 63.7%.

L.A. schools Supt. John Deasy, who has pushed to increase graduation rates, said he was particularly pleased with the results considering the devastating cuts in state funding that occurred while the 2013 graduates were in school.

"These results came at the absolute bottom of all the cuts, and we still saw improvement," Deasy said.

The superintendent attributed the gains to the work of teachers and staff, as well as an effort to steer funding to struggling schools, and investments made in programs geared toward dropout recovery and prevention.

"Considering all the challenges we have in L.A., I'm very pleased and proud," Deasy said.

Although the progress is welcome, some educators and others contend that the state is cheering piecemeal progress while alarming differences in achievement still exist.

"It's good to be optimistic and happy about the incremental success that we've had," said Valerie Cuevas of Education Trust-West, an Oakland-based education advocacy group. "But 1 in 4 Latino students are still not graduating from high school — that's a problem."

This year's annual report is the fourth compiled under a system that tracks individual students from the time they enter high school in ninth grade until they are seniors. The calculation does not allow direct comparison with years before 2009, but it is widely believed that the numbers are more accurate.

California's black and Latino students, although lagging behind white and Asian classmates, continued to make slight gains in graduation rates. For Latinos, the improvement was 1.7%; for African Americans, it was 1.9%.

The graduation rate among white students improved one percentage point, to 87.6%. For Asians, the improvement was half a percentage point, to 91.6%.

The positive momentum should continue as the state moves to a new funding system that allocates more money to schools with disadvantaged students, such as those from low-income families and those still learning English, said state Supt. of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson.

"There's some good news, but there's a lot of work to do in front of us," he said. "We can — we must — do better to help all our students graduate."

Improvement, particularly within the burgeoning Latino population, must come at a quicker pace if California is to meet job needs and maintain the economic vitality of the state, Cuevas said. The influx of funding should be used strategically to help the most vulnerable within the underperforming groups, such as students who are not fluent in English, Cuevas said.

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Gov. Jerry Brown's fiscal pitch gets warm reception

SACRAMENTO — Gov. Jerry Brown received a warm welcome from lawmakers Monday as he pitched his proposal to pay off debt and save money for future economic downturns.

He faced only one mild question during a rare appearance before a legislative committee, joked about what office he might hold more than a decade from now and played his greatest-hits talking points about stabilizing California's tumultuous finances.

"There's nothing complicated about the idea of saving money," Brown said as he urged Democrats and Republicans to unite behind his proposal. "Voters can understand it."

Brown's testimony before the Assembly Budget Committee, part of a special legislative session he called to focus attention on his proposal, was another sign of his willingness to throw his personal political capital behind the measure.

Judging by his reception, Brown is on safe ground. One Republican, Assemblywoman Diane Harkey of Dana Point, praised the governor's handling of the budget and lamented that he "will only be here for another term," already assuming Brown will win reelection in November.

Committee members repeatedly praised the governor, and toward the end of the hearing Assemblyman Richard Hershel Bloom (D-Santa Monica) added, "I'm not going to rain on this parade."

Under Brown's proposal, spikes in revenue from capital gains taxes would be placed in a reserve fund or used to pay debts and other long-term costs, such as public pensions. California has had a reserve fund since 2004, but it has mostly sat empty. Brown says there should be stronger rules on paying into it.

"If we were angels, we wouldn't need any of these things," he said. "We would just, every day and every year, make very wise judgments. But we haven't proven that to be the case, so we're going to try a little bit of protective restraint."

Brown will need Republican support to push his proposal through the Legislature, because criminal investigations have cost Democrats their supermajority in the Senate. His measure, a constitutional amendment that voters would have to approve, requires a two-thirds vote before it can go on the ballot.

One of Brown's opponents in the governor's race, former U.S. Treasury official Neel Kashkari, has said lawmakers should approve Brown's plan, which the Republican candidate called "a small incremental step in the right direction."

Republican lawmakers have already expressed willingness to back off a competing proposal for a rainy-day fund, which Democrats have criticized as too restrictive on spending. However, the Republicans want more constraints than Brown has proposed to dictate when lawmakers can pull money out of the reserve.

The governor said he was open to compromises, such as raising the vote threshold in the Legislature for withdrawing money and using it to prevent budget cuts during a recession.

There are signs that the Democratic leaders of the Assembly and Senate are divided on some details.

Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez (D-Los Angeles) wants to finalize the measure before the Capitol is consumed by annual budget negotiations, which begin in earnest in mid-May, when the governor releases his revised spending plan.

Finishing early, Pérez told reporters, "lays the foundation for the assumptions of the budget."

Senate leader Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) wants to slow down the debate, expressing concern that it is being rushed.

"A poorly designed constitutional amendment would be difficult to fix," Steinberg said on the Senate floor. "It's therefore paramount in my view that we work purposefully, but we don't rush it."

Steinberg said he wanted to see a greater emphasis on tackling the shortfall in the state's teacher pension fund and restoring money to government services. Advocates for the poor are also urging more funding for healthcare and social services.

Advocates plan to rally Tuesday at the Capitol to call for $5 billion more in spending on such services. They're confounded by Brown's push to save for the future when some cuts made during the recession have yet to be restored.

"We believe in rainy-day funds, but for a lot of people it's still raining," said Anthony Wright, who promotes expanded health coverage at Health Access.

To drive their point home Tuesday, demonstrators plan to carry umbrellas.

chris.megerian@latimes.com

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Donald Sterling's ties to NAACP under scrutiny after race recording

Five years ago, when the local chapter of the NAACP wanted to give Clippers owner Donald Sterling a lifetime achievement humanitarian award, Los Angeles' African American community was divided.

Sterling had been a prominent donor to the NAACP chapter for more than a decade. He ran newspaper ads touting his charity's generosity to L.A. organizations that help the poor communities.

But the real estate magnate had just paid $2.73 million to settle U.S. government claims that he refused to rent his apartments to Latinos and blacks in Koreatown.

"The NAACP airbrushed this away and simply said that Sterling has been a gem in giving oodles of tickets away to needy inner city kids and ladling out some cash to charities and sports camps for them," community activist Earl Ofari Hutchinson wrote at the time on his website.

The organization decided to go ahead give him the award. And in May, it was set to hand him a second honor as part of a gala marking the NAACP's 100th anniversary.

Then recordings emerged in which a man said to be Sterling asked a female friend not to publicly associate with African Americans.

This time, the NAACP withdrew the award. But as the scandal unfolds, some have questioned why it had associated itself with Sterling for all these years.

Leon Jenkins, president of the NAACP branch, declined to say how much Sterling had given the organization recently.

He said he didn't cut ties with Sterling until now because the group was reluctant to make decisions based on "rumors."

"We deal with the actual character of the person as we see it and as it is displayed," he said.

Jenkins said NAACP officials spoke with Sterling in 2009 about the housing discrimination case as well as a suit that NBA great Elgin Baylor filed accusing Sterling of racism when he ousted Baylor as general manager.

Baylor claimed that the organization had a "plantation mentality" in a deposition, and that Sterling rejected a coaching candidate, Jim Brewer, because he was black.

Jenkins said the NAACP officials told Sterling: "If any of the allegations in those lawsuits are true, you need to pay those people, you need to make amends."

In 2011, Baylor dropped the race allegations from the suit, and Sterling hired an African American coach, Doc Rivers, last year.

The NAACP tried to build partnerships with other sports franchises in Southern California, Jenkins added, but "his organization was the only one that really came to the front."

The chapter had recently been talking to Sterling about giving an endowment to Los Angeles Southwest College and donating more money to African American students at UCLA.

"That is something that shows — I don't want to get into the good or bad — but it shows there's a consciousness about the plight of African Americans and Hispanics," Jenkins said.

On Monday, Jenkins said the organization would refund the money that Sterling donated. He did not say how much that would be.

But he rejected a call by the national leader of the NAACP, Lorraine C. Miller, to rescind the 2009 award.

"This is not a Heisman Trophy, dude," Jenkins told a reporter.

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L.A. County sheriff's deputy to plead guilty to building assault rifle

A Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy has agreed to plead guilty to illegally building an assault rifle, marking the first plea agreement by one of 20 sheriff's officials charged or indicted since December in an ongoing federal investigation of the Sheriff's Department, authorities said Monday.

Richard White Piquette admitted in a document filed in federal court last week that he manufactured a Noveske Rifleworks N-4 .223-caliber rifle with an eight-inch barrel. Under federal law, the rifle's barrel length should have been at least 16 inches, said Thom Mrozek, a spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office in Los Angeles.

The charge carries up to 10 years in prison. Piquette could formally enter his plea as early as this week, though his sentencing will take place at least several weeks later, Mrozek said.

Piquette, who was previously assigned to the Twin Towers Correctional Facility, also admitted possessing a shotgun that had been stolen from the Sheriff's Department and three assault weapons that are banned under California law, according to the plea agreement. The deputy was not charged in connection with those weapons, but his admission will probably affect his sentence.

As part of Piquette's agreement with federal prosecutors, a separate charge of possessing an unregistered short-barreled rifle will be dropped and Piquette must resign from the Sheriff's Department.

Piquette's attorney, Ronald Hedding, described his client as "a good man" who has family members in law enforcement. Hedding said he believed it was common practice for sheriff's deputies to have weapons like the ones his client possessed.

"A lot of these criminals are carrying these types of weapons on the street," Hedding said, adding that Piquette was a jail deputy but had done training stints on patrol.

Piquette's indictment was unsealed in December along with criminal charges against 17 other current or former sheriff's officials, most of whom are accused of assaulting jail inmates or obstructing the FBI's probe of brutality and other misconduct in the county's jail system. Since then, two more deputies have been charged in connection with the investigation.

A Sheriff's Department spokeswoman said Piquette was hired in February 2008 and was relieved of duty on Feb. 18, 2013, the same day federal prosecutors say he was in possession of the weapons. He has been on administrative leave without pay since January 2014, she said.

jack.leonard@latimes.com

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State to provide $75 million in mental health grants

State Treasurer Bill Lockyer has announced the approval of $75.3 million in grants that aim to stabilize residents with severe mental illness before they land in jails or hospitals.

The grants will go to 28 counties for new or expanded services. They will add 827 residential mental health beds and crisis "stabilization" beds, and pay for more than three dozen vehicles and five dozen staff members for mobile support teams, which often accompany local law enforcement to defuse tense situations and direct those in need to care.

More than half of the funding — $40.9 million — will go to Los Angeles County, which plans 16 new residential crisis care facilities, each with room for 16 adult residents, including those who are also struggling with substance abuse.

Such "co-occurring disorders" are common, but many programs are not equipped to handle both. The maximum stay in the centers would be 21 days.

The county also plans four new urgent care units, in the San Gabriel Valley and South Bay, where there now are none. Each will have beds for a dozen adults and six adolescents. The centers are meant for stays of 24 hours or less as clients are assessed and connected to other resources.

The county also will add 16 new mobile support teams.

The grants were approved last week by the California Health Facilities Financing Authority, which Lockyer chairs.

"These programs will save lives, help keep mental health patients out of jails and hospital emergency rooms, and prevent needless suffering," he said in a statement.

The money awarded amounts to about half the disbursements allowable under the Investment in Mental Health Wellness Act of 2013, which was created by legislation sponsored last year by Senate leader Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento). There will be subsequent funding rounds.

"Our criminal justice system and hospital emergency rooms are packed full of people who end up there because they were arrested or hospitalized during a mental health crisis and had nowhere else to go," Steinberg said in a statement. "More crisis residential beds and mental health crisis teams can make the difference between recovery and a downward spiral into severe mental illness."

Randall Hagar, government affairs director for the California Psychiatric Assn., said initial negotiations also called for funding to operate the new facilities but those dollars didn't make it into the final bill. As a result, he said, many rural counties with acute mental health needs did not apply.

"They just can't afford to do it," Hagar said.

Although he praised the residential and urgent crisis beds as "a good model" and said it's "hard to say anything bad" about such a healthy disbursement of funds, Hagar also expressed disappointment that none of the funding went to beds for those under legal psychiatric holds.

There is a stark shortage of such beds as well, but funding involuntary care is politically sensitive.

In a January notice to grant applicants, the financing authority explained that "projects that include restrictive environments will likely be less competitive and consequently, less likely to be funded."

Of the other grants approved:

• Riverside, San Diego, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara and Ventura counties received $7.9 million for residential beds, $4.7 million for stabilization units and $1.8 million for mobile crisis support.

-• The Bay Area counties of Santa Clara, Alameda, Sonoma, Marin and Contra Costa received $8.8 million for residential beds, $2.7 million for stabilization units and $990,000 for mobile crisis support.

• The Central Valley counties of Fresno, Merced, Sacramento, San Joaquin and Yolo received $2 million for residential beds, $2.6 million for stabilization units and $1.1 million for mobile crisis support.

• The northern counties of Butte, Nevada, Lake and Mendocino received $867,000 for residential beds, $500,000 for stabilization units and $296,000 for mobile crisis support.

In addition to Los Angeles, three counties — Sonoma, Fresno and San Joaquin — plan to reserve some stabilization beds for adolescents, who are particularly underserved.

lee.romney@latimes.com

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V. Stiviano shies from public eye amid Donald Sterling controversy

V. Stiviano's Instagram feed is full of bling — designer handbags, the interior of a Bentley, glamour shots of herself.

But on Sunday morning, she was uncharacteristically shy, hiding behind the door of her $1.8-million Spanish-style duplex near the Beverly Center. She told a reporter she was on her way to church.

A photo Stiviano posted on Instagram of herself with Lakers legend Magic Johnson was the main topic of a taped conversation in which a man said to be Clippers owner Donald Sterling asks her not to publicly associate with African Americans.

Since Friday night, when TMZ posted what it said were the recordings between Sterling and Stiviano, she has emerged as a central figure in the scandal, which has generated widespread condemnation and has prompted the National Basketball Assn. to launch an investigation.

On the audiotape, Stiviano appears to spar with the man said to be Sterling, pointing out that she herself is black and Mexican. At other times, she is conciliatory, apologizing and tenderly offering him a sip of juice.

The Clippers have not confirmed that Sterling is the voice on the tape and in a statement said the owner doesn't hold the views expressed in the recording. Stiviano's attorney, Mac Nehoray, said Sunday the tape is authentic but that his client did not release it to TMZ.

Much of what is known about Stiviano and the Clippers owner is laid out in a series of bitter legal filings made over the last few months.

Nearly 50 years Sterling's junior, Stiviano was sued last month by Sterling's wife, Rochelle, who seeks the return of the duplex as well as a Ferrari, two Bentleys and a Range Rover she said her husband bought for Stiviano.

Rochelle Sterling alleges in the lawsuit that her husband met Stiviano at the 2010 Super Bowl in Miami. The suit describes Stiviano, 31, as a seductress who targets wealthy older men like the 80-year-old Sterling.

According to property records, Stiviano purchased the duplex in December 2013. But Rochelle Sterling says that she allowed her husband to pay for the house, believing that her name would be on the deed along with his.

Sterling also gave Stiviano $240,000 for living expenses, according to Rochelle Sterling's lawsuit, amounting to $2 million of community property that he allegedly spent on Stiviano without his wife's knowledge.

In a response to the lawsuit, Stiviano argues that Rochelle Sterling must have known that her husband of more than 50 years had romantic relationships outside of his marriage.

Stiviano's court filing ridicules the notion that the "feminine wiles of Ms. Stiviano overpowered the iron will of Donald T. Sterling who is well known as one of the most shrewd businessmen in the world." Stiviano's papers, however, do not acknowledge that she was in a romantic relationship with Sterling.

"Neither Ms. Stiviano, nor this office has ever alleged that Ms. Stiviano is, or ever was, Mr. Sterling's girlfriend," Nehoray said in a statement Sunday night.

Nehoray wrote in court papers that his client was "a veritable fixture" at Sterling's business offices. A Clippers spokesman said Stiviano does not work for the team, though he said it is possible she is employed by one of Sterling's other business ventures.

An advertisement for a 2011 charity luncheon lists Stiviano as a director of the Donald T. Sterling Charitable Foundation, with Sterling as chairman.

In 2010, Stiviano legally changed her name to V. Stiviano from Maria Vanessa Perez. Her stated reason in a court petition: She had not "yet been fully accepted because of my race."

Since then, she has created hats and shirts emblazoned with "V. Stiviano." Her Instagram is dotted with photos of people posing in the "V. Stiviano" gear.

Nehoray said in a statement that the tape is part of an hourlong conversation between Stiviano and Sterling.

On the tape, Stiviano asks if she should change the color of her skin. The man identified as Sterling said "that isn't the issue" but asks why she is "taking pictures with minorities," referring to Johnson.

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17 candidates for Waxman's seat compete for spotlight at 2-hour forum

On the biggest political stage of the election season in California, the 17 candidates competing to succeed Rep. Henry Waxman struggled to stand out Sunday at a forum that was long on issues and short on time.

Some common priorities emerged among those hoping to occupy the seat that Waxman, a Beverly Hills Democrat, is giving up after four decades: traffic woes and public transportation needs, ways to improve public education and a desire to get special-interest money out of politics — espoused even by some with the biggest war chests.

The two-hour forum, organized by the Brentwood News and held at University Synagogue, marked the first time all candidates appeared together — the largest field of any contest on the June 3 primary ballot. An 18th candidate dropped out after it was too late to remove his name from the ballot.

The event drew an audience of about 400 mostly polite, attentive listeners.

The only two candidates who have held elected office — former Los Angeles councilwoman and controller Wendy Greuel and state Sen. Ted Lieu of Torrance, both Democrats — said they had the experience and track records to get things done.

"I'm a fighter and a doer," Greuel said, listing such accomplishments as getting federal aid to victims of the 1994 Northridge earthquake when she worked in Washington and helping to tighten city campaign rules as a local official.

Lieu cited his tenure on the Torrance City Council and in both houses of the state Legislature as evidence that he "can work across the aisle" to help break partisan gridlock in Congress.

But several first-time candidates tried to turn Greuel's and Lieu's political experience into a liability.

"It's time for something different," said Green Party member Michael Ian Sachs, an environmental technician from Redondo Beach.

Author and public radio talk show host Matt Miller, a Democrat, touted his work in the Clinton administration and in advising Fortune 500 companies, saying the experience prepared him to be the best candidate "who can bring the change we all know we need."

And TV director and producer Brent Roske, one of three candidates running without a party affiliation and the first candidate to announce his bid, said he would try to form a "congressional district council" of all the candidates — and Waxman too.

"It's all about working together" without party labels to get in the way, Roske said.

Another no-party candidate, spiritual teacher and bestselling author Marianne Williamson, brought along supporters who punctuated with cheers and applause her spirited calls to rid politics of special interests and reverse "the dismantling of our democracy."

A handful of candidates — Williamson, Greuel, Lieu, Miller, Republican gang prosecutor Elan Carr and defense attorney and Democrat David Kanuth — have raised at least $300,000 to campaign in the sprawling, heavily Democratic 33rd congressional district.

For the others, who have raised little or no money to reach voters from the Westside to Malibu and along the coast through the Palos Verdes Peninsula, forums such as Sunday's are one of the few ways they have to get their ideas across. Some, attempting to connect more with the audience, brought their microphones down the steps to speak near the front row of seats rather than stay on the makeshift dais.

Environmental health advocate and Republican Kevin Mottus used his time to warn of health hazards posed by cellphones and other wireless technology.

Attorney Barbara Mulvaney, one of 10 Democrats on the ballot, criticized the importance placed on a candidate's campaign treasury and proposed "a $200,000 rule."

"You look up here and pick the best candidate who has raised less than $200,000" as a way to minimize the influence of money in politics.

There were lighter moments. Libertarian candidate Mark Matthew Herd drew laughs when he said in his opening remarks, "If you read the L.A. Times this morning, you probably didn't know I exist." He was referring to a Sunday article on the presumed front-runners in the race, sorted mostly by fundraising strength.

The logistics of trying to accommodate such a large field clearly posed a challenge. More than half the two-hour event was required just to get through the candidates' opening statements of three minutes each.

And to fit on the makeshift stage, the contestants sat in two rows, one behind the other. They were told to switch places halfway through the forum, so that each would have equal time in front.

There was a "lightning round" of questions — different for each candidate — with an allowed response time of 30 seconds. Another 30-second round allowed the competitors to say whatever they felt was most important to communicate.

By the time they arrived at their 90-second closing statements, several candidates blurted out their campaign website addresses, hoping that at least some audience members would seek more information there.

jean.merl@latimes.com

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A variety of California kingsnake is wreaking havoc in Canary Islands

An albino variety of California kingsnake popular in the pet trade has infested the Canary Islands, decimating native bird, mammal and lizard species that have had no time to evolve evasive patterns in what was once a stable ecology northwest of Africa.

Unchecked by natural predators, the kingsnake population has exploded, say U.S. Geological Survey biologists helping the Spanish archipelago attempt to control the highly adaptive and secretive predators.

"The kingsnakes in question are from a species found in San Diego and bred in captivity," said Robert Fisher, a research biologist with the USGS. "Some of their offspring wound up in the Canary Islands via the international pet trade, and then got loose.

"Now, their densities are going through the roof."

Fisher is among three U.S. experts heading to the Canary Islands in May to advise scientists and government officials on the behavior and potential vulnerabilities of the snakes that first raised alarms in 2007.

Since then, their populations have swelled to thousands per square mile in the eastern and northwestern portions of the 602-square-mile volcanic island of Gran Canaria — a kingsnake haven because of its mild temperatures, moist ocean air and lush terrain teeming with prey that never learned to fear snakes.

Dogs and hawks have been used in organized assaults against the snakes. So far, fewer than 2,000 have been snared, most of them discovered slithering over the ground.

"The trouble is, these snakes spend much of their lives beneath the ground," said Robert Reed, an invasive species specialist with the USGS. "So my message to people in the Canaries will be this: The fact that you're removing hundreds of visible snakes means, unfortunately, that it is likely that there are many, many thousands more out there you can't see."

Brian Hinds, president of the California chapter of the North American Field Herping Assn., will arrive in Gran Canaria with proposals for dealing with what he described as a "monumental task." Among them: plowing up infested areas with earth movers.

"They need to strike back hard and fast," said Hinds, who says he has personally captured more than 3,000 California kingsnakes. "They're not called kingsnakes for nothing."

The Canary Islands are another example of what can happen when an invasive snake gets a foothold in an otherwise balanced ecosystem. Brown tree snakes have established themselves as a breeding species in the Pacific island of Guam. The Florida Everglades have been invaded by Burmese pythons. The venomous wolf snake was introduced to the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius.

In the Canary Islands, albino and striped varieties of California kingsnake, known in scientific texts as Lampropeltis getula californiae, are roughly 30% larger than their wild counterparts in Southern California.

"They are a heck of a generalist predator, so they'll be eating any lizard they can fit in their mouths," Reed said.

Canary Island biologists fear that the snakesmay be nibbling three native species of gecko, skink and giant lizard into extinction.

"The data obtained show that the California kingsnake has a high ability to adapt and its spread to all of the islands is more than likely," said a 2012 study funded by the European Union and published by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. "This snake will quite possibly impact the local reptilian population to the point where we see their total disappearance."

Canary Island officials hope to eventually reduce their numbers by half, if possible.

"Most control programs for invasive reptiles are initiated long after the problem has gotten out of hand," Reed said. "Unfortunately, this sort of thing will probably become more common as international borders fall, incomes rise and more people get interested in owning exotic pets."

louis.sahagun@latimes.com
Twitter:@LouisSahagun

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Kashkari says Bush, Romney and other GOP leaders aiding his campaign

Gubernatorial candidate Neel Kashkari, who is trailing badly in the polls, said Sunday that former President George W. Bush, 2012 presidential nominee Mitt Romney and other Republican leaders are aiding his campaign.

"A lot of people nationally have been helping," he told reporters after speaking to a Republican women's convention in Orange. "[Former Florida Gov.] Jeb Bush has been helping, [former Indiana Gov.] Mitch Daniels has given a lot of advice on economy policy.

"President Bush has been very helpful and made calls and opened doors," Kashkari said. "There are a lot of people who care about California."

The candidate said in his speech that Romney was providing "a lot of help." When asked if an endorsement was expected, Kashkari replied: "Stay tuned."

A former Treasury official who has never held elected office, Kashkari faces major challenges in his bid for the governor's chair.

He is virtually unknown, and his campaign has failed to raise the money it had hoped for. He has banked about $1.6 million, a fraction of the amount needed to reach voters statewide. Polling shows that his main GOP rival, Assemblyman Tim Donnelly of Twin Peaks, near Lake Arrowhead, is likely to win one of the top two spots in the June primary election; that would allow him to take on incumbent Gov. Jerry Brown in the fall.

Kashkari, who has spent much of his time trying to raise money since announcing his bid in January, said he planned to ramp up his efforts to reach voters.

"We're now at the final stretch between now and the primary, and absentee ballots are going to be mailing soon," he said. "The vast majority of voters today aren't paying attention to this race yet. They don't know who any of the candidates are."

He said "paid voter outreach" — typically television and mail ads — "is going to be very important to introducing me to all the voters who don't know me … or any of the other Republican candidates right now."

Donnelly, who has been running an insurgent campaign on a shoestring budget, has spent most of his time reaching out to Republican activists, Tea Party groups and others. On Sunday, he marveled at his front-runner status among the GOP candidates.

"It's scary. It's fantastic," he told reporters after speaking at the gathering. "I haven't spent a penny on advertising and I'm surging ahead in the polls, and my best-funded opponent, the one who has the most serious components of a campaign, is not gaining traction at all."

Donnelly, who is more conservative than Kashkari, said his lead in the polls shows that California Republicans don't want to become more centrist, which many in the establishment have suggested is the party's path back to power.

"I've never believed in that. I don't believe people want you to become more moderate or centrist," he said. "People respect people who are passionate about what they believe. They might not agree with you, but the key is your passion comes through, that you care about the people you're fighting for."

Brown is the overwhelming favorite to win in November, but Donnelly said he believes the mood of the electorate would make him a strong challenger.

"There's something in the air, that people want a fighter, they want someone to go and pick the right fight and take a stand. I think it indicates that I have a really good chance of unseating Jerry Brown.

"Doesn't that strike a little chord of fear in your heart?" he said, laughing.

seema.mehta@latimes.com

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O.C. veterans propose cemetery on former Marine base

When American Legion Chaplain Bill Cook peered through the chain-link fence at the windswept landscape — a broken runway, scrubby fields and green foothills in the distance — he remembered the Phantoms.

The fighter jets were once a regular sight, slicing through the air over what was for decades a bustling military base.

"The jets would just roar," he said on a recent afternoon at the old U.S. Marine Corps Air Station El Toro.

Now the Vietnam veteran is leading the charge to transform a small piece of that land into a final resting place for Orange County's veterans.

Cook and others have been pushing for a veterans cemetery here since El Toro closed in 1999, but the idea is finally gathering steam as the old base is transformed into a sprawling park and neighborhoods of new homes.

The proposal has gained the support of legislators, county supervisors, city officials and veterans groups, though some have worried about a sustainable funding source.

But the most daunting hurdle may well be placing a cemetery next to planned tracts of homes that are being marketed to Asians.

The developer who is building the thousands of homes on the rim of the Orange County Great Park has consulted a feng shui master to review the names of streets, the bends in the roadways and the design of the homes to ensure a proper flow of energy.

In a city that is already 40% Asian, it is expected that the new homes — many which will hit the market with listing prices over $1 million — will be sold to buyers arriving from Asia.

And a cemetery is simply bad feng shui.

::

In the early 1940s, when the base was teeming with soldiers training for war, the airfield was isolated among vast orange and avocado groves.

But as the high-end suburbs of South County fanned out, the base became hemmed in by tract homes, schools and shopping centers. The Marines finally left in 1999.

What they left behind was an enormous stretch of land, about 4,600 acres dotted with abandoned barracks and hangars and crisscrossed with runways. The transformation into parkland, sports fields and homes follows years of legal disputes and political wrangling.

Bill Sandlin, a member of the Orange County Veterans Memorial Park Committee, believes there's still room here for those who served their country.

"I want to do all I can to make sure this place maintains some of its Marine identity," said Sandlin, who transported Marines headed for the brig between the base and Camp Pendleton in the early 1960s.

Local veterans say the former base would be the perfect site for a much-needed military cemetery in a region with a growing — and aging — population of veterans.

The sprawling Los Angeles National Cemetery in Westwood has been closed to new burials for about 20 years, and the Riverside National Cemetery is miles from Orange and Los Angeles counties, far more populated areas.

Stephen Jorgensen, who oversees memorials and cemeteries for the California Department of Veterans Affairs, estimated that about 14,000 veterans die every year in Orange and Los Angeles counties. The Riverside cemetery, which Jorgensen ran for more than a decade, handles about 8,000 burials each year.

"I know we didn't serve a lot of people out of those two counties, even though Riverside is the most active veterans cemetery in the country," Jorgensen said.

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From Rwanda to Redlands

As a boy, Patrick Manyika looked up and watched packages of corn and canned fish fall from the sky.

An airplane streamed overhead, dropping supplies to the hundreds of refugees living in isolation in the rolling hills and forests of northeast Rwanda.

The relief packages read "USAID" — it was the first word he would learn to read.

Manyika lived as a child in exile on the land of a national park, survived the Rwandan genocide as a teenager and eventually made his way to a private university in Southern California. He earned a bachelor's degree at the University of Redlands, and on Saturday walked across the stage there with a master's degree in business administration.

No family members attended his graduation, but Manyika, 33, said he had been aided by friends he met here.

"I am nothing by myself," he said. "It is all because of everyone who helped me."

His education was funded by a family he befriended on his first trip to the United States, and he credited his classmates and professors with easing his life once he settled here.

He struggled to adapt to his new home. Even though he speaks six languages, his English was spotty. Freeways were confounding. He once tried walking to campus on Interstate 10. Someone later told him to not do that. "I figured something was fishy," he said.

He wasn't sure how to turn on the air conditioning in his apartment and became dehydrated. Instead of water, Manyika drank soda until a friend advised him against it. In his country, direct eye contact and a firm handshake were insults.

"Everything was opposite, upside down," he said.

A few months after arriving he wanted to return home. He missed his family.

"But I had to do a cost-benefit analysis," he said. "What I'm gaining here is more than what I am losing."

Manyika was born in a refugee camp in Uganda after his family fled from unrest in Rwanda. Soon they were forced back. With nowhere to go, they lived in Akagera National Park, where he would chase zebras for fun and learned to build traps out of trees to catch food.

In 1987, Manyika and his mother and younger sister went to Rwanda's capital, Kigali, hiding their identities as Tutsis so the children could go to school.

In 1994, the deaths of the Rwandan and Burundian presidents, both Hutus, sparked the killings of more than 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus by Hutu extremists.

At one point, Manyika remembers opening his front door and a neighbor, wielding a machete, vowed to kill him and his family.

The family fled to a soccer stadium controlled by United Nations forces, where they lived for weeks while war raged around them. The stadium was constantly under attack. His immediate family survived, but he estimates that more than 50 other relatives and friends were killed.

"When I came to see my other family members, they were all gone," he said.

Manyika would continue his studies, attending a university in Rwanda before deciding to delay his education to work. He was hired by Partners in Health, an organization that seeks to implement a stable healthcare system in the country. He loved the job but realized he lacked the business expertise to advance his career.

The group sent him on a trip to the U.S., where he visited the Redlands campus. A San Francisco Bay Area family he met offered to fund his studies if he chose to remain in the U.S. He applied to Redlands, was accepted and began in 2009.

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Community art project to offer ideas on how to improve MacArthur Park

Getting the strangers to open up wasn't easy.

But Jesus Rodriguez, a high school senior, pressed on, clipboard and questionnaire in hand.

He and about 15 other students spent Thursday evening at MacArthur Park, interviewing people about their lives, their well-being and the health of their neighborhood.

Their responses will be the basis for an intricate art installation to be displayed at the park in the fall.

For Rodriguez, 18, the exercise was eye-opening. He spent two hours approaching random men and women, some of them homeless.

"It's made me realize how much people are affected," Rodriguez said. "You can't just drive by a neighborhood and think you know everything. You have to stop and talk to those who live there."

The event, called Story Summit, has taken place every year since 2003 in neighborhoods across the city. It was organized by L.A. Commons, a community program that uses art to give a voice to underrepresented areas.

This particular gathering featured Aztec dancers, arts and crafts workshops and free tamales.

"This is a way to support the youth and the neighborhood and to show that art is really valuable to a community," said Beth Peterson, director of L.A. Commons' community arts program.

Last year's MacArthur Park art installation — puzzle pieces depicting black and white scenes from the park — hangs prominently from light posts. The pieces will be on display for several more months.

This year, students will create papel picado bunting, with flags as long as 8 feet. The traditional Mexican cutouts will be made from plastic tablecloths and feature images inspired by the students' findings. They will hang from five giant trees facing the south side of the park on West 7th Street.

On Thursday, the young people tried their best to get folks talking. They asked, among other things:

What are challenges to you and your family's good health? How does your job affect your health? What is your vision for a healthy neighborhood?

Some of the interviewers were taken aback by how personal some of the answers were.

"This man started crying to me," said Armando Larios, 17. "I asked him about his family. He said he regretted everything he's put them through. He said he was an alcoholic and now he's alone."

Many opinions seemed universal.

People said they loved the park; it's one of the few open spaces in a dense area filled with overcrowded apartments. But they were tired of the litter, the gangs, the drugs and the fast food outlets. They wanted more fresh fruits and vegetables and better schools.

"I want to see the grass green, not full of brown spots all the time," said Fatima Lujano, 12.

When they spoke about how work affects their health, many said they work so much, they hardly sleep. Others worry because they work around chemicals and never have time to see a doctor.

Adrian Guerrero, a junior at Robert F. Kennedy Community Schools in Koreatown, listened closely and took notes as people spoke to him.

He began visualizing the images he could create for the installation.

"I'm picturing doing an angel with no face, with his chest being opened up by chains," he said. "Something powerful that captures people's struggle in this place."

esmeralda.bermudez@latimes.com

Twitter: @LATbermudez

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As Clippers lose a playoff game, pressure mounts on owner Sterling

As the Clippers struggled through a playoff loss in Oakland, the pressure on team owner Donald Sterling mounted Sunday with the release of additional minutes of a racially charged recording and a flurry of denunciations from President Obama, NBA players, fans and even the NAACP that had sought to honor him.

The comments about blacks that were attributed to Sterling show "the United States continues to wrestle with the legacy of race and slavery and discrimination," said Obama during a visit to Malaysia. "When ignorant folks want to advertise their ignorance, you don't really have to do anything, you just let them talk. That's what happened here."

Two websites posted recordings over the weekend that they identify as a conversation between Sterling and a female friend. A person the websites identified as Sterling can be heard castigating the friend for associating with blacks — even though Sterling's team and the league it plays in are 80% African American.

The NBA is investigating the remarks, which have yet to be authenticated, and a decision on possible punishment for Sterling is expected soon. Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson, a former NBA player who serves as an advisor to the league's players union, said the harshest possible sanctions must be considered by the league.

A lawyer for the woman, V. Stiviano, said Sunday that the tapes were "legitimate" and that they came from a conversation that was roughly an hour long. The lawyer said his client didn't leak the recording to the media.

As the league delves into the matter, calls to punish the 80-year-old owner are growing within NBA ranks. The Clippers themselves took the lead in repudiating Sterling. Before Sunday's game, they took off their warm-up tops and tossed them in unison near the jump-ball circle, revealing their shooting shirts turned inside-out to hide the Clippers logo. They wore black wristbands and black socks.

NBA legends continued to chime in.

"I'm completely outraged," said a statement from Michael Jordan, owner of the Charlotte Bobcats, echoing sentiments made by NBA star LeBron James, former All-Star Charles Barkley and Lakers legend Magic Johnson a day earlier. "There is no room in the NBA — or anywhere else — for the kind of racism and hatred that Mr. Sterling allegedly expressed."

Also, the L.A. chapter of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People announced that it would not give Sterling a lifetime achievement award he was scheduled to receive next month.

Sunday's extended version of the recording — nearly six extra minutes released by Deadspin that add to the roughly 10 minutes the gossip site TMZ made public Friday night — appeared to worsen matters for Sterling.

After discussing Stiviano's Internet posting of pictures with Magic Johnson and Dodgers star Matt Kemp, the person Deadspin identified as Sterling tells her, "Don't come to my games. Don't bring black people and don't come."

They bicker for a while, and then the male voice tells her: "It's the world. You go to Israel, the blacks are treated like dogs."

"And are the black Jews less than the white Jews?" Stiviano asks.

"A hundred percent," he says.

"And is that right?" Stiviano asks.

"It isn't a question," he replies. "We don't evaluate what's right and wrong, we live in a society. We live in a culture, we have to live within that culture."

He adds that he can't change the culture. Of himself, he says: "I don't want to change."

He can again be heard continuing to castigate Stiviano for associating with African Americans.

Later, Stiviano, who describes herself as black and Mexican, asks if he's even aware that his team is mostly black.

"Do I know?" he says. "I support them and give them food, and clothes and cars and houses."

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Exotic species are settling in at L.A. Zoo's new rain-forest exhibit

The Los Angeles Zoo's new Rainforest of the Americas exhibit doesn't open until Tuesday, but it is already filled with commotion.

Dwarf caimans and a giant bird-eating spider were exploring the creature comforts of their enclosures this week. Construction workers were inspecting thermostats and water pumps.

The $19-million exhibit at the Los Angeles Zoo and Botanical Gardens is the last in a series of major projects built under Phase 1 of the 47-year-old facility's master plan. Over the last 15 years, the zoo has opened exhibits for some of its biggest draws: pachyderms, gorillas, chimpanzees, orangutans and Komodo dragons.

The rain-forest exhibit, spread across two acres, is designed to create the sensation of walking through luxuriant foliage teeming with exotic wildlife — and boost visitor numbers, revenue and international cooperation on behalf of endangered species pushed to the edges of their once broad native ranges.

"Some of these species are unique in the animal kingdom, as well as in zoological facilities," said zoo Director John Lewis. "We can't wait to get visitors as excited as we are about them and in preserving their habitat in Mexico, Central and South America."

The exhibit has built-in appeal for the 58% of the zoo's annual visitors with cultural ties to Mexico and Central and South America, all places where rain forests are common, and zoo officials hope it will draw enough interest to help ease the facility's financial woes. Funding for zoo operations, including marketing, comes largely from a city subsidy that has dwindled from $10 million six years ago to $263,000.

The largest display in the exhibit features a forest glen overlooking a stream emptying into a lagoon. The expanse is shared by river otters 6 feet in length; red-bellied piranhas; freshwater stingrays; and a pair of critically endangered primates known as cotton-top tamarins.

Also roaming the grounds are two Central American tapirs, hefty mammals that reach a height of about 4 feet and use their dexterous snouts as snorkeling devices when submerged in water.

With the zoo's tight budget, its fundraising arm — the private, not-for-profit Greater Los Angeles Zoo Assn. — for the first time has taken responsibility for raising the facility's public profile, enhancing the visitor experience and pushing annual attendance, now about 1.6 million, toward 2 million.

Under a three-year plan, the association will provide $2 million of its own money to market the zoo. The L.A. City Council has until September to ratify a memorandum of understanding to make the plan official.

"Our offer has kick-started a more vibrant business plan for marketing all that the zoo has accomplished until now," said the association's president, Connie Morgan. "Now we can begin laying out a vision for the years ahead."

Projects the association is considering include creating roomier exhibits and more natural settings for species that are nearing extinction because of habitat loss, wildfires, hunting and a rare-animal trafficking trade that spans the globe.

Among those improvements is an addition to the rain-forest exhibit reserved for three jaguars, scheduled to open early next year.

At the exhibit last week, a pair of rough-scaled crocodilians known as dwarf caimans sprawled in a shallow pool that doubles as an Amazon river.

"We've got ringside seats for admiring some of the most unusual characters in nature," said Sybil MacDonald, a zoo spokeswoman.

louis.sahagun@latimes.com

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Parking activists to team up with Mayor Eric Garcetti for change

A grass-roots group that has been railing against Los Angeles' parking ticket policies has agreed to team up with Mayor Eric Garcetti to look at changes to the enforcement system.

Steven Vincent, founder of the Los Angeles Parking Freedom Initiative, said Garcetti invited members of his organization to participate in an official city working group. The panel, Vincent said, will look at an array of possible changes, such as reducing certain fines, expanding parking hours in key locations, making no-parking signs less confusing and halting the practice of using ticket revenue as a tool to balance the city's budget.

The Parking Freedom organization announced last year it was seeking to put an overhaul of the city's parking enforcement policies on the March 2015 municipal ballot. If the new working group fails to accomplish the goals sought by activists, the L.A. Parking Freedom Initiative will launch a signature-gathering drive to put the changes directly to voters, said Vincent, a market analyst who lives in Studio City.

"What we want is real, systemic reform," he said.

Penalties for parking violations have grown steadily over the last decade as the city's elected officials used ticket revenue to balance the budget. Parking citation proceeds have grown from nearly $110 million in 2003 to about $161 million this year, according to the mayor's budget.

Parking at an expired meter is now a $63 violation, and the penalty for parking on street-sweeping day is $73. "That's pretty unreasonable, in my view," Vincent said.

Garcetti spokesman Jeff Millman said it was "premature" to say whether motorists pay too much for parking tickets. The mayor promised to create a working group two weeks ago, when he unveiled his first budget proposal, and "wants to start a discussion," he said.

"We know that parking tickets are frustrating for Angelenos, and it's our policy that enforcement should be about traffic management and safety," Millman said.

Aides to the mayor met with Vincent's group Wednesday. Vincent said his organization has agreed to find people to serve on the working group, which will also include city officials.

Garcetti's budget does not call for any increases in parking penalties this year. However, his recently released financial plan does seek the hiring of 50 part-time parking enforcement officers, a move expected to generate an additional $3 million in ticket revenue this year.

Millman said the additional part-time officers are needed, in part, to reduce overtime and clear streets that are slated to be repaved. The extra officers also will be used to free up other personnel assigned to special events and traffic control, he said.

Vincent's group denounced the budget proposal earlier this week, saying Garcetti had "chosen to continue along the beaten path of aggressive ticketing as a budgetary salve." On Thursday, Vincent said he was more focused on the larger changes that will be tackled by the working group.

The process for challenging incorrect tickets needs to be completely revamped, he said. In addition, city officials have been too willing to balance the budget by tapping a fund dedicated to the construction of new parking garages, Vincent added.

david.zahniser@latimes.com

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45-unit complex to double number of Vernon's voters

The industrial city of Vernon in southeast Los Angeles County has long been known for its small number of residents and voters — just 42 turned out for a municipal election last year, for example.

So on Friday, when city leaders and state and national elected officials announced the groundbreaking of a new apartment complex in the city, it was hailed as a good governance reform that will bring more voters to the city.

The 45-unit Vernon Village Park is hailed as an environmentally conscious, energy-efficient facility that, as city officials put it, "will make the concept of a live/work community a reality in Vernon."

Vernon Village Park is expected to more than double the number of voters in the city when it is completed in 2015, and officials said it would be affordable for low- to moderate-income families.

The facility will feature one-, two- and three-bedroom units with balconies and patios, a play area for children and an edible garden.

Vernon was the focus of scrutiny after a series of scandals at City Hall. The city came under criticism from state legislators who argued that its government was controlled by a small group of individuals rather than a legitimate voting population. Legislators attempted to disincorporate the city in 2011, but that effort failed.

Vernon officials agreed to a series of reforms, including building more housing to add to the voter rolls.

metro@latimes.com

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$10 million to be spent on sidewalks next to city properties

Los Angeles lawmakers gave the green light Friday to spend $10 million to repair broken sidewalks next to parks, libraries and other city facilities.

Despite public demands to step up sidewalk repairs, the action had been delayed because council members were concerned about how the spending might figure into negotiations to settle a related lawsuit. But with the budget year drawing to a close in two months, and chances increasing that the budgeted funds might not be spent as promised, the City Council decided to move forward.

It remains to be seen how quickly the money can be spent and whether officials can avoid having unencumbered leftover funds swept back into the city's general budget for next year. City Administrative Officer Miguel Santana says the goal is to spend at least $3 million on sidewalk repairs before the end of June.

Failing to spend the repair money as planned would mean "we're kind of kicking the can down the road," said Jessica Meaney, Southern California policy director for the nonprofit Safe Routes to School National Partnership.

Roughly 40% of city sidewalks may need to be fixed or replaced, according to the Bureau of Street Services. The city faces a yawning repair bill, estimates show. Budget officials have proposed a sales tax increase that would generate $640 million toward the repairs. That would allow the city to tackle the worst problems, but fixing every damaged sidewalk is expected to cost far more.

Despite the backlog, a council committee earlier this year chose to hold off on spending the $10 million.

Councilman Paul Krekorian said lawmakers waited because of a lawsuit filed by residents with disabilities, who say that broken sidewalks violate their rights to public access. Krekorian said the council wanted to avoid any spending that would not count toward a possible settlement.

The committee ultimately approved a plan that dedicated the dollars to fixing sidewalks next to city facilities. The plan is designed "to move this money as quickly as possible into the areas where it will have the most impact in improving accessibility for the public — which is around the public's facilities," Krekorian said Friday.

The decision disappointed those who wanted the city to prioritize repairing the most dangerous, heavily used sidewalks. City officials said repairs next to city facilities could be done the fastest. Santana added that the city also is clearly responsible for those sidewalks, an important distinction amid an ongoing debate over who should bear repair costs.

Pedestrian advocates have emphasized the need for rapid action.

"We still have hazardous sidewalks out there that people have to traverse every day, going to school or getting to their jobs," said Deborah Murphy, executive director of Los Angeles Walks. "Everybody in Los Angeles witnesses this every single day."

emily.alpert@latimes.com

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