Bernson Is a No-Show as 5 Challengers Attend Forum

Undeterred by the absence of Los Angeles City Councilman Hal Bernson, five candidates challenging him in the April 9 primary election discussed their views on development, crime and other issues Tuesday in the first public forum of the race.

Bernson spokesman Hal Dash said the councilman did not attend because he had a prior engagement to speak to a group of Porter Ranch homeowners.

Dash said that meeting was “more important than this thing.”

Bernson’s challengers said they were not surprised the councilman did not appear at the forum, held at a Northridge school, which attracted about 75 people.

“I don’t expect him to show up at anything unless he can control the environment. . . . If he didn’t have an appointment tonight, he would have made one,” said Allen Hecht, a print shop owner from Granada Hills.

The event was sponsored by the 12th Council District Candidate Forum Committee, a group of about a half-dozen homeowners and community activists from the southeastern portion of Bernson’s district, according to organizer Sherman Gamson.

Dash said he had never heard of Gamson’s group, which was formed last month, and suspected it was “loaded against Hal.”

He noted that three of the challengers--Hecht, school board member Julie Korenstein and Northridge businessman Walter Prince--recently banded together to pay for a public opinion poll.

Referring to the forum, Dash said: “Who’s to say that two or three of them didn’t cook this up?”

Gamson, who is an official of the Democratic Party of the San Fernando Valley, insisted the forum was strictly a nonpartisan affair.

Also running against Bernson are Los Angeles police detective Arthur Kagele and Granada Hills retiree Leonard Shapiro, who publishes a newsletter devoted to City Hall issues.

A sixth opponent, attorney Ronald Michelman of Chatsworth recently failed to submit sufficient voter signatures to qualify for the ballot but is still campaigning as a write-in candidate.

Michelman did not appear at the forum.

Dash said he did not know if Bernson will appear at similar forums, but said he will consider them “if it is a legitimate discussion of community issues, it’s controlled and he gets a fair shake, rather than going into these mass flagellation efforts.”

At the forum, most of the candidates pledged to restrict population growth and new construction, saying they were badly damaging the quality of life in the council district.

Korenstein criticized Bernson for being “in the palm, in the hands of the developer” of the massive Porter Ranch project.

When completed, the project will bring nearly 3,400 new dwelling units and 6 million square feet of office space to the hills north of Chatsworth.

Calling the ranch an “environmental disaster about to happen to us,” Korenstein said that Bernson has accepted more than $55,000 from its builder, Nathan Shappell, and his business associates.

Bernson has said he voted for the project on its merits, and was not swayed by the donations.

Prince said he would do “everything in my power to shut down the project as it now stands.”

Korenstein said that although Bernson is campaigning as a crime-fighter and has said that the crime rate dropped 2% last year in the area’s Devonshire police division, it has risen 73% since he took office in 1979.

Kagele said that Bernson speaks as if he created the district’s anti-crime Neighborhood Watch program, but it really was “put together years ago by the Police Department.”