He's a very odd duck
Published: Sunday, Mar. 13, 2011 - 2:00 am | Page 1E
Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez dotes on his rubber ducks, a varied flock collected over years and arranged just so on his office desk and hutch.
But lately, Capitol denizens are witnessing another one of Pérez's preoccupations. It's anything but whimsical.
Past Assembly leaders used their power to place huge school construction bonds before voters, expand child health care and push landmark environmental protection.
Not Pérez.
With California facing a $26.6 billion deficit and tight deadline for achieving a breakthrough, Pérez ignited one of the year's hottest lobbying fights over an issue that has nothing to do with the budget mess.
He is seeking to abolish the city of Vernon, a strange Los Angeles-area enclave founded in 1905 as a locale for heavy industry and slaughterhouses.
A year into his tenure as speaker, Pérez is showing himself to be something of an odd form of fowl. He is a quick study and a tough negotiator. But some legislators say privately he has grown imperious and insular.
Having never held office until he won his Assembly seat in 2008, he can be heavy-handed, suggesting insecurity if not immaturity.
Under term limits, the clout of a speaker has waned. But the office remains influential, wielding life-and-death power over every piece of legislation introduced in this state.
Pérez is using all that sway to dismantle Vernon. Some of his foes say he or his operatives have employed intimidation, a charge he denies.
Pérez has concluded that Vernon is more corrupt than the neighboring Bell, where officials looted the treasury and paid themselves exorbitant salaries.
"When the light of day is shined upon the activities in Vernon, Vernon is going to make Bell look like a blip," Pérez told me, on the day Brown set as the deadline for passing the budget. "It is a horribly, horribly corrupt city."
Vernon is an anachronism and may deserve to die. Certainly, its governance should be altered. It's a city in name only, with fewer than 100 residents, all of whom have some connection to the city hall, though it's also an economic power that employs 50,000 people.
Its ex-mayor held office for decades before being convicted of breaking a state law requiring that elected officials live in the districts they represent. He resided in one of Los Angeles' nicest areas, far removed from the industrial city of Vernon.
Vernon's former city administrator faces charges of misusing city funds for services including massages, but not before accruing the fattest pension of any public official in California, $500,000 a year.
From 1984 to 2006, the city held no elections. Pérez says democracy there is a "sham," and he won't stand idly by while it continues.
Vernon has had more than its share of problems. However, Pérez is speaker for the entire state, not merely of one burg in his Assembly district. He would do well to focus on issues with statewide sweep, such as the $26.6 billion deficit or stubbornly high unemployment.
Instead, he has staked his prestige on the fight, and cannot afford to lose.
Neither can Vernon. The city has retained blue-chip law firms, lobbyists and consultants, and will spend millions to defend itself.
In his effort to abolish Vernon, Pérez dwells on the importance of democracy. There's a measure of irony in that rhetoric.
Pérez owes his 2008 election to Los Angeles' political machine that includes his cousin, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who along with a few other labor and political insiders hand-picked Pérez to represent the 46th Assembly District.
To run, Pérez had to move into the district, a heavily Latino area that includes downtown Los Angeles and stretches southeast to Vernon.
Election after election, turn-out in the district is the lowest of any in the state. Pérez won the primary by garnering a mere 4,905 votes – this in a district of more than 420,000 people. The primary victory was tantamount to election in the safe Democratic district.
Perez remains close to organized labor. Labor accounts for almost a third of the $3.6 million he has raised into his campaign accounts.
But he also is crossing some union allies with his assault on Vernon, where many factories are union shops.
Barry Broad, a longtime labor lobbyist, counts himself among Pérez's friends, though the Vernon fight has frayed that relationship.
Broad is working to kill Pérez's bill on behalf of the Teamsters, who fear that a disruption to the city would threaten businesses and their jobs.
Broad was taken aback by what he viewed as strong-arm tactics employed by one of Pérez's operatives.
Broad said in a March 4 letter to Pérez's aides that Pérez's campaign consultant Doug Herman told another consultant, Theo Yedinsky, who was working on Vernon's behalf, "that the Speaker was 'keeping a list' of those who did work in opposition to his bill on Vernon and that retribution was coming."
"Mr. Herman needs to call Mr. Yedinsky and apologize," Broad wrote. "And any other threats that are being made against people who disagree need to stop right now."
Yedinsky, president of a social media firm, Social Stream Consulting Inc., said he had never received a call like the one from Herman. It was "unprofessional and unethical."
Herman later sent Yedinksy a note apologizing "if there was a misunderstanding." But Herman, whose firm, the Strategy Group, has done extensive campaign work for labor and Pérez, told me that Broad's allegation was false. Pérez called such allegations "preposterous."
On the day that Pérez and I spoke, Brown's deadline for approving the budget came and went. Pérez is confident he will be able to muster sufficient budget votes when the time comes.
He has shown himself able to rally support, albeit for the bill to abolish Vernon. He has enlisted 23 of 40 senators and 66 of 80 Assembly members to sign on as co-authors of the Vernon bill.
Lobbyists and legislators speculate about why Pérez has spent so much time focused on Vernon. His goal may be, as he says, to root out corruption. Or maybe he sees the fight as a way to burnish his image for a future campaign.
Whatever his motivation, Pérez has become bogged down in a fight that has no relevance in most of the state. That's unfortunate, given that the speaker's pond is far larger than the quagmire that is the city of Vernon.
But lately, Capitol denizens are witnessing another one of Pérez's preoccupations. It's anything but whimsical.
Past Assembly leaders used their power to place huge school construction bonds before voters, expand child health care and push landmark environmental protection.
Not Pérez.
With California facing a $26.6 billion deficit and tight deadline for achieving a breakthrough, Pérez ignited one of the year's hottest lobbying fights over an issue that has nothing to do with the budget mess.
He is seeking to abolish the city of Vernon, a strange Los Angeles-area enclave founded in 1905 as a locale for heavy industry and slaughterhouses.
A year into his tenure as speaker, Pérez is showing himself to be something of an odd form of fowl. He is a quick study and a tough negotiator. But some legislators say privately he has grown imperious and insular.
Having never held office until he won his Assembly seat in 2008, he can be heavy-handed, suggesting insecurity if not immaturity.
Under term limits, the clout of a speaker has waned. But the office remains influential, wielding life-and-death power over every piece of legislation introduced in this state.
Pérez is using all that sway to dismantle Vernon. Some of his foes say he or his operatives have employed intimidation, a charge he denies.
Pérez has concluded that Vernon is more corrupt than the neighboring Bell, where officials looted the treasury and paid themselves exorbitant salaries.
"When the light of day is shined upon the activities in Vernon, Vernon is going to make Bell look like a blip," Pérez told me, on the day Brown set as the deadline for passing the budget. "It is a horribly, horribly corrupt city."
Vernon is an anachronism and may deserve to die. Certainly, its governance should be altered. It's a city in name only, with fewer than 100 residents, all of whom have some connection to the city hall, though it's also an economic power that employs 50,000 people.
Its ex-mayor held office for decades before being convicted of breaking a state law requiring that elected officials live in the districts they represent. He resided in one of Los Angeles' nicest areas, far removed from the industrial city of Vernon.
Vernon's former city administrator faces charges of misusing city funds for services including massages, but not before accruing the fattest pension of any public official in California, $500,000 a year.
From 1984 to 2006, the city held no elections. Pérez says democracy there is a "sham," and he won't stand idly by while it continues.
Vernon has had more than its share of problems. However, Pérez is speaker for the entire state, not merely of one burg in his Assembly district. He would do well to focus on issues with statewide sweep, such as the $26.6 billion deficit or stubbornly high unemployment.
Instead, he has staked his prestige on the fight, and cannot afford to lose.
Neither can Vernon. The city has retained blue-chip law firms, lobbyists and consultants, and will spend millions to defend itself.
In his effort to abolish Vernon, Pérez dwells on the importance of democracy. There's a measure of irony in that rhetoric.
Pérez owes his 2008 election to Los Angeles' political machine that includes his cousin, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who along with a few other labor and political insiders hand-picked Pérez to represent the 46th Assembly District.
To run, Pérez had to move into the district, a heavily Latino area that includes downtown Los Angeles and stretches southeast to Vernon.
Election after election, turn-out in the district is the lowest of any in the state. Pérez won the primary by garnering a mere 4,905 votes – this in a district of more than 420,000 people. The primary victory was tantamount to election in the safe Democratic district.
Perez remains close to organized labor. Labor accounts for almost a third of the $3.6 million he has raised into his campaign accounts.
But he also is crossing some union allies with his assault on Vernon, where many factories are union shops.
Barry Broad, a longtime labor lobbyist, counts himself among Pérez's friends, though the Vernon fight has frayed that relationship.
Broad is working to kill Pérez's bill on behalf of the Teamsters, who fear that a disruption to the city would threaten businesses and their jobs.
Broad was taken aback by what he viewed as strong-arm tactics employed by one of Pérez's operatives.
Broad said in a March 4 letter to Pérez's aides that Pérez's campaign consultant Doug Herman told another consultant, Theo Yedinsky, who was working on Vernon's behalf, "that the Speaker was 'keeping a list' of those who did work in opposition to his bill on Vernon and that retribution was coming."
"Mr. Herman needs to call Mr. Yedinsky and apologize," Broad wrote. "And any other threats that are being made against people who disagree need to stop right now."
Yedinsky, president of a social media firm, Social Stream Consulting Inc., said he had never received a call like the one from Herman. It was "unprofessional and unethical."
Herman later sent Yedinksy a note apologizing "if there was a misunderstanding." But Herman, whose firm, the Strategy Group, has done extensive campaign work for labor and Pérez, told me that Broad's allegation was false. Pérez called such allegations "preposterous."
On the day that Pérez and I spoke, Brown's deadline for approving the budget came and went. Pérez is confident he will be able to muster sufficient budget votes when the time comes.
He has shown himself able to rally support, albeit for the bill to abolish Vernon. He has enlisted 23 of 40 senators and 66 of 80 Assembly members to sign on as co-authors of the Vernon bill.
Lobbyists and legislators speculate about why Pérez has spent so much time focused on Vernon. His goal may be, as he says, to root out corruption. Or maybe he sees the fight as a way to burnish his image for a future campaign.
Whatever his motivation, Pérez has become bogged down in a fight that has no relevance in most of the state. That's unfortunate, given that the speaker's pond is far larger than the quagmire that is the city of Vernon.
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