warning Hi, we've moved to USCANNENBERGMEDIA.COM. Visit us there!

Neon Tommy - Annenberg digital news

Wendy Greuel's Supporters Defend Her Skills

Paresh Dave |
March 3, 2013 | 11:00 p.m. PST

Executive Director

Clockwise from left, Lola Beltran, Lucy Mendoza, Letty Galvan and Patricia Rodriguez are among those who support Wendy Greuel. (Paresh Dave/Neon Tommy)
Clockwise from left, Lola Beltran, Lucy Mendoza, Letty Galvan and Patricia Rodriguez are among those who support Wendy Greuel. (Paresh Dave/Neon Tommy)
The latest round of criticism of L.A. mayoral candidate Wendy Greuel came this week from city councilmen Richard Alarcon and Bernard Parks. They told the Los Angeles Times that the visionary and idealistic thinking Greuel demonstrated during her time working for Mayor Tom Bradley in the late 1980s disappeared when she joined the city council in 2001. But several supporters said this week that what counts is her ability to accomplish goals, whatever they may be.

As Greuel toured Los Angeles rallying for votes Sunday, she stopped for more than hour in Dolores Mission Catholic Church. Before sitting through mass next to councilman Jose Huizar, she chatted under a canopy with six women who thanked her for one of her accomplishments -- helping create the afterschool program, L.A.'s BEST, while a mayoral aide.

"She helped bring that here," said Patricia Rodriguez, who spends six hours each Sunday huddled around a plastic table in the church courtyard with her friends.

Rodriguez and her friend, Lucy Mendoza, also said they related to the fact that Greuel was a mother and knew how to care for children.

"She's a woman, and it's time for a woman, a mother mayor," Mendoza said.

SEE ALSO: Wendy Greuel's Ties To Tom Bradley Recognized In His Old Neighborhood

After working for Bradley, Greuel went to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. She was among those leading recovery efforts after the 1994 Northridge earthquake.

The White House deputy assistant at the time, John Emerson, said he remembers Greuel and Housing Secretary Henry Cisneros walking down streets in the San Fernando Valley three to four nights in a row helping move people into temporary housing or shelters.

“At the end of the day, it was pretty happy and impressive story about well the government was able to respond,” Emerson said.

Mickey Kantor, President Bill Clinton’s Trade Representative at the time, said the recovery from the earthquake “was nothing short of miraculous.”

But as a councilwoman, her critics charge that she zeroed in on smaller problems such as potholes, drag races and a lack of bus routes.

Lara Bergthold, one of Greuel's first mayoral campaign supporters, said even those issues prove her abilities.

“When drag racing became an issue in her district, she navigated that with community leaders, business leaders and drag racers,” she said.

Her latest job, as the city’s fiscal watchdog, has led to more criticism.

In September 2009 came Wendy Greuel's first audit as city controller. She said the Los Angeles Convention Center failed at controlling overtime. Among other things, she called for a private-public partnership to get the Convention Center to realize its full financial potential. More than three years later, the city council still hasn't made significant progress on privatizing some of the center’s operations.

“Your job is point out of the faults, but there’s no built in ability to make the changes,” Bergthold said. “You end up being the Chicken Little, but not so much the person who can implement the changes.”

Another audit by Greuel found that the city had squandered some federal stimulus grants because it couldn’t efficiently handle the huge influx of funds. Greuel had witnessed something similar years earlier. When she was a federal administrator of post-earthquake recovery funds 18 years earlier, then-city controller Rick Tuttle said the city’s housing department had plenty of “system weaknesses.”

In early January, the Times labeled Greuel as a “leading target” of attacks because of the strong financial support her campaign has had from the powerful union representing Department of Water and Power workers. Greuel then became the first candidate to launch a TV ad in the mayor’s race, and the Los Angeles pilloried it, pointing out her dubious claim of $160 million in potential savings from ridding the city government of waste.

Kantor said Greuel’s opponents deserved political credit for taking her to task over the figure during debates. But he said whether it was $109 million or $200 million, it’s clear Greuel did her job to identify inefficiencies in the government.

“No one has said she hasn’t done a good job,” Kantor said. “Maybe part of that is Wendy’s campaign’s fault.”

While outside candidates such as Kevin James or Emanuel Pleitez have a right to criticize, he said the others -- Eric Garcetti and Jan Perry -- who sat on the council had every opportunity to act on Greuel’s audits.

“There’s a lot of bright, decent people in this race, but who can get things done is the question voters have to answer,” Kantor said.

Like reporter Paresh Dave on Facebook, follow him on Twitter, circle him on Google+ or send him an e-mail.



 

Buzz

Craig Gillespie directed this true story about "the most daring rescue mission in the history of the U.S. Coast Guard.”

Watch USC Annenberg Media's live State of the Union recap and analysis here.