Mayor Agrees to Pay Ameriquest $150 for Gift Basket That Exceeded Ethics Limits

An attorney for Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said Wednesday that Villaraigosa accepted a prohibited gift from Ameriquest in June when he received a gift basket worth $250 and will write a check to the company to comply with the law.

Villaraigosa was a city councilman, as well as mayor-elect, when he received the basket from Ameriquest Capital Corp. on June 9. He worked as a consultant for the mortgage lending firm in 2001 and 2002.

City ethics laws prohibit elected officials from accepting gifts worth more than $100 from restricted sources, defined to include companies that have retained lobbyists to influence City Hall. Ameriquest has long employed former Assemblyman Mike Roos as a lobbyist to the mayor’s office and other city departments, dealing with lending issues.

“It was in excess of what it should have been,” said Thomas Saenz, the mayor’s general counsel, about the gift. “We are filing an amended report to reflect that he is reimbursing $150 of the amount. It was a mistake.”

The reimbursement will be made out of Villaraigosa’s campaign account and will bring him into compliance with the gift restriction, Saenz said.

The city conducted a review of the gift after the Los Angeles Times asked about it.

It is the second check written to Ameriquest by Villaraigosa in recent months.

The Times reported earlier this month that Villaraigosa borrowed an Ameriquest jet to fly Nov. 1 with an aide, two bodyguards from the Los Angeles Police Department and a pastor from Van Nuys to Detroit to speak at the funeral of civil rights veteran Rosa Parks. They returned the next day.

At the time, Villaraigosa wrote a check to cover $438 each for himself and his aide, the equivalent of coach fares on a commercial airline. Critics said he should have reimbursed Ameriquest for much more, given that a private jet company at Van Nuys charges nearly $20,000 for the same round-trip flight.

Kathay Feng of California Common Cause, who took issue with the amount paid by the mayor, said Wednesday that Villaraigosa was doing the “right thing to write a check for the gift basket.”

But she said it was unclear whether using campaign funds is proper and called on the city Ethics Commission to develop clearer standards for accepting and returning prohibited gifts.