Forwarded from another list. -- radman
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From: Michael Novick <part2001@usa.net>
Subject: Tom Hayden files for open LA City Council seat
Movement lawyer Art Goldberg is also planning a run for the seat
his sister Jackie Goldberg will vacate if as expected she is
elected to the state legislature. Hayden and Goldberg would
certainly bring a lot of awareness of the depth of the problem
of police abuse to the LA City Council.--MN
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Thursday, September 7, 2000
Hayden to Join Race for Council Seat
Politics: High-profile state senator faces the challenge of having to
focus on local issues.
By TINA DAUNT, PATRICK MCGREEVY, Times Staff Writers
Ousted from the state Senate by term limits, Tom Hayden--a once and,
perhaps, future mayoral candidate--filed Wednesday to run for Mike Feuer's
Los Angeles City Council seat.
The Westside liberal is expected to formally announce his candidacy
today at a news conference on Mulholland Drive, overlooking the council
district that stretches from Westwood to Van Nuys.
By joining the council race, Hayden becomes the front-runner in an
already crowded field of strong but less well-known candidates, according
to political consultant Richard Lichtenstein.
"He has got a higher profile than the other candidates and he has the
best ability to raise campaign funds," Lichtenstein said.
However, several observers said Hayden faces a challenge of focusing
more on local bread-and-butter issues than on the broader policy questions
on which Hayden is used to campaigning.
"The issues when you run for council are about tree trimming and
streets and other fundamentals as opposed to more global issues such as
health care," Lichtenstein said.
Hayden has taken a leading role in pursuing legislative remedies to
the issues raised in the Los Angeles Police Department's ongoing Rampart
corruption scandal. He also has been a prominent critic of alleged abuses
by the Immigration and Naturalization Service in the neighborhoods policed
by the Rampart station. There, and in other parts of the city, he also has
been active in promoting truces and other local initiatives to combat gang
violence.
"Too many people feel too little connection to decisions that affect
their lives in this fast city," Hayden said Wednesday. "The urban quality
of life, even in affluent communities, seems besieged by congestion,
pollution, failing schools, unresponsive bureaucracies, ethnic divides and
tensions, which can suddenly flare into violence. Local businesses are
being replaced by indifferent multinational ones and local voices go
unheard amid remote downtown control."
Feuer, who does not plan to endorse anyone before the primary, agreed
that Hayden makes the race more interesting.
Hayden was a household name long before he ran for the Assembly in
1982. As a college student, he helped found Students for a Democratic
Society and volunteered as a freedom rider, seeking to desegregate the
South. More recently, he was known for his 16-year marriage to actress Jane
Fonda and for his opposition to the Vietnam War. In the last mayoral race,
he unsuccessfully challenged incumbent Richard Riordan.
Hayden, who lives in Brentwood and has until the end of the year to
move into Feuer's district, was elected to the Senate in 1992 after
previously serving a decade in the Assembly. Because the term-limits law
didn't take effect until 1990, he could run again for a seat in the
Assembly and serve two two-year terms if elected.
Last November, however, Hayden announced that he was ready to leave
state politics.
"As I now approach 60 years of age, including 40 years of activism, I
began to wonder if there were other ways to combat racism, poverty,
inequality and corruption," Hayden wrote in a letter to supporters.
He said that running again for political office in Los Angeles would
allow him to be closer to his family.
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