The Los Angeles Times from Los Angeles, California • Page 21

LOCAL NEWS WEATHER EDITORIAL PAGES SECTION METRO WEDNESDAY JULY 31, 1991 CCt floe Angeled Stones Loss of Taxes Seen as Huge Blow to L. A. HIGHLIGHTS City Hall: Officials say state high court ruling will cause problems more worrisome than recent budget deficit. Layoffs termed possible. equals roughly 10 of the city's annual general fund.

"This decision makes every other financial problem we've had in the past couple of years pale by comparison," said Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky, head of the powerful and Finance Committee. "This will have a devastating effect on Los Angeles. It even makes the $177-mil-lion deficit problem well, now we will look back at that with nostalgia." Yaroslavsky predicted that the judgment will result in either a "hard freeze" in hiring at the Los Angeles Police Department or layoffs of other city employees. Budget hearings on how to make up the shortfall will start next week, he said. Yaroslavsky vowed to oppose any increased taxes on Los Angeles residents as a result of the ruling.

He indicated that the ruling makes it unlikely the Fire Department soon would end its controversial "rolling brownouts" at local stations. The $230-million judgment is 10 times the department's $23-million budget cutback that prompted the brownouts. "When response time of our paramedics increases, when response time of police officers responding to crimes increases, don't call your councilman," Yaroslavsky said angrily. "Call CalFed (California Federal Savings Loan). Call your local savings and loan institution." Martin S.

Schwartz, an attorney representing CalFed and other financial institutions, criticized the city for proceeding with its tax collections and failing to set aside money for the possibility that it might lose the case. Please see TAXES, B4 The city also will lose $20 million in annual revenue from taxes on the institutions that the Supreme Court says it no longer may charge. City officials said the exact amounts were still being calculated Tuesday. Officials said the judgment is believed to be the largest against the city, at least in recent decades. It surpasses the $177-million projected budget deficit during this year's deliberations.

The judgment will have such a severe impact, officials said, that they hope to use an obscure government "hardship code" to repay the money on the installment plan over a decade. The $230 million By LAURIE BECKLUND TIMES STAFF WRITER A California Supreme Court decision that Los Angeles had illegally collected $230 million in business taxes from financial institutions could result in layoffs and take a staggering $50 million annually from the city coffers for the next 10 years, city officials said Tuesday. The unanimous ruling means the city must give back to some 40 savings and loans and other financial institutions a total of $230 million in taxes, plus interest since 1982. LOMAX INVESTIGATED: The California State Bar is investigating attorney Melanie Lomax for releasing confidential city legal memos to a civil rights group seeking the ouster of Police Chief Daryl F. Gates.

Bl PARK HONORS EX-SLAVE: A park in the middle of a $24-million downtown shopping complex and garage has been dedicated to former slave Biddy Mason, who bought the land for $250 in 1866. Bl 2 AIDED RAPE VICTIM: Police say a misunderstanding was to blame for reports that hundreds of people walked or drove by as a homeless man raped and beat a mentally retarded woman in Santa Monica. One passerby tried to restrain the assailant while another called police, officials said. B3 Proud Legacy Park Opens on Site Owned by L. A.

Pioneer mm State Bar Probes Lomax's Release of Legal Memos Police Commission: She says she believes Gates' lawyer filed a complaint against her, but he denies it. She steps down as the panel's acting president. By SHERYL STOLBERG TIMES STAFF WRITER Attorney Melanie Lomax, who stepped down Tuesday as acting president of the Los Angeles Police Commission, is being investigated by the State Bar of California for her controversial decision to release confidential city legal memos to a civil rights group seeking the ouster of Police Chief Daryl F. Gates. At the commission meeting, Lomax publicly disclosed the investigation by the State Bar, the agency that licenses and regulates lawyers.

She also said she believed a complaint had been filed against her by Jay Grodin, a lawyer for Gates an allegation the chief's attorney promptly denied. "I did nothing of the sort," Grodin said. Lomax also confirmed that in light of the State Bar investigation she briefly gave thought to asking the Police Commission to consider retroactively approving the release of the documents. An item on the printed agenda for Tuesday's meeting called for "consideration, discussion and ratification" of the release, but Lomax asked that the item be withdrawn. "In hindsight, I decided it would not be appropriate," she said in an earlier interview, noting that three of the commission's five members were not in office when the documents were released in April.

She added, "I think that it is very important for this new commission to be untarnished by the past." Please see LOMAX, B4 Marina Investors' BCCI Ties Probed Supervisors: Board wants to know the role in scandal-plagued bank played by Saudis, who hold county leases in hotels and other interests. IOKKLNNKUV Angeles rimes DISPUTE OVER: Isidore Mandel is one of 20 permanent residents of the historic Clark Hotel in downtown Los Angeles who ended a three-year battle with developers who wanted to evict them by agreeing to leave for about $86,000 each and six-year payments of $250 a month. B3 KENLUBAS Los Angelas Times Gladys Owens Smith in front of photo showing her great-grandmother Biddy Mason, for whom park is named. Below, crowd at dedication. GUEST COLUMN Reporter Jesse Katz takes us on a trip to The Short Stop, just down from the Police Academy on Sunset Boulevard.

It's a place where a cop can shake off the weariness of the day, and where racial and sexist epithets are dished out so matter-of-factly that they almost lose their meaning. B2 By BOB POOL TIMES STAFF WRITER Robynn and Cheryl Cox couldn't believe it when they learned that their great-great-great-great-grandmother was a famous Los Angeles pioneer. Neither could classmates at their Culver City elementary school. But there it was, spelled out for all to see in fourth-grade history books. A full page was devoted to Biddy Mason, a onetime Mississippi slave who fought to win her freedom and became a major Los Angeles landowner and philanthropist in the late 1800s.

"My friends didn't believe me when I said, 'That's my recalled 11-year-old Robynn. Cheryl, now 13, said: "One girl said if that was true, I'd be rich now." But there were no doubts about their family's rich heritage on Tuesday, when the two girls snipped a ribbon to help open the $900,000 Biddy Mason Park in downtown Los Angeles. Land at 333 S. Spring St. that Biddy Mason purchased for $250 in 1866 has been turned into a $24-million high-rise parking garage and shopping arcade called the Broadway Spring Center.

In the middle is a tree-shaded mini-park and rest area dedicated to Mason. An 81-foot-long concrete time wall sculpture at the edge of the park traces Mason's life. It tells of how she was born a slave in 1818, grew up to be a nurse and midwife and then walked across the continent behind her master's wagon train in 1848. After meeting freed slaves in San Bernardino, Mason went to court to win her freedom in 1856. For the next 10 years, she saved her wages from her midwife and nursing work to buy property between Spring Street and Broadway.

In the years that followed, "Biddy Mason's Place" became known as a day-care center and orphanage and as the meeting place for the city's first African Methodist Episcopal Church. In the 1880s, Biddy Mason financed a disaster center for residents left homeless by flooding. "I think Biddy Mason saw the possibilities when she came to Please see PARK, B8 EDITORIALS CALIFORNIA JUSTICE: Although Gov. Pete Wilson selected an outstanding jurist as his first nominee to the state Supreme Court, a bench made up of seven whites does not reflect California's diversity. B6 ON THE RECORD "This bank is also called the Bank of Crooks and Criminals.

I want to know that. we're not involved in it." Kenneth Hahn, after county supervisors ordered an Investigation to determine the connection between Saudi Investors in county-owned Marina del Rey and the scandal-ridden Bank of Credit Commerce International. Bl By JEFFREY L. RABIN TIMES STAFF WRITER Los Angeles County Supervisors ordered an immediate investigation Tuesday to determine the extent of the connection between Saudi investors in county-owned Marina del Rey and the scandal-ridden Bank of Credit Commerce International. Responding to a report in The Times, the supervisors unanimously called on the Sheriff's Department and other county agencies to investigate the link between billionaire Saudi businessman Abdul Aziz al Ibrahim and $130 million in questionable loans from BCCI.

The Times reported Saturday that Ibrahim's family was identified in a 1990 audit of BCCI by the Price Waterhouse accounting firm as a major holder of loans from the bank for which proper documentation could not be found. A Washington-based spokesman for Newfield Enter-Please see MARINA, Bt LITTLE LOTTO RESULTS July 30 Tuesday's Winning Numbers: 2-4-17-20-2 1-28 DECCO Tuesday's Winning Cards: Police to Bolster Patrols in Holly wood to Curb Gang Cruising Hearts: Queen Clubs: 7 Diamonds: Ace Spades: 6 respond to a report in The Times about the sharp rise in crime in Hollywood. Police statistics show that there has been a 16 increase in serious crimes and a 50 rise in murders in the last six months compared to last year, leading to a situation that one police gang specialist described as "out of control." Levant said police have recently been more aggressive in cracking down on cruisers and teen-agers who are on the streets past the 10 p.m. curfew. Gang members in increasing numbers have been mingling with carloads of youths who traditionally cruise parts of Holly-Please see HOLLYWOOD, B4 oversee Hollywood and the three other Westside police divisions, said later in an interview that he has asked police headquarters for even more officers to help fight the crime problem.

Meanwhile, Councilman Michael Woo, who represents Hollywood, introduced a motion Tuesday asking for $12,800 to improve the anti-cruising enforcement effort in the movie capital, in addition to the $50,000 in emergency funds already approved last month for extra Department of Transportation barricades and traffic police. Levant said Police Department officials called the news conference to "The crime problem is unusual," said Deputy Police Chief Glenn Levant, "so it called for unusual measures to get it under control." The "Cruiser Task Force" will be made up of Police Department squad car, bike and foot patrol officers, city traffic officers, gang specialists and juvenile narcotics specialists. Levant also announced that special teams of uniformed off-duty motorcycle officers will direct traffic at the Hollywood Bowl area on weekend nights to prevent the concert traffic flow "from further contributing to the cruising problem on Hollywood Boulevard." Levant, appointed in February to By JOSH MEYER TIMES STAFF WRITER Responding to a sharp increase in crime in Hollywood, Los Angeles police on Tuesday announced the deployment of a special 70-officer task force to control cruising by gang members on its famous boulevards. In addition, eight officers and one sergeant will be assigned to foot patrols in a high-crime area near Yucca Street and Wilcox Avenue on an almost around-the-clock basis, police said at a news conference held at Hollywood Division headquarters. INDEX Digest B2 Air Quality B5 Weather B5 Editorials B6 Commentary B7.