Villaraigosa Seeks Funds, Keeps Up Profile on Hill

WASHINGTON —  Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is becoming a Capitol regular.

“That red-eye is starting to wear on me,” he told about 30 members of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce after joining them near the Capitol on Tuesday. But despite that, he said of his trip to the nation’s capital: “This won’t be my last time.”

Since his election a year ago today, Villaraigosa has been to Washington more than half a dozen times, ostensibly to lobby for local issues that conveniently score him face time with congressional leaders on- and off-camera.

On Tuesday, the start of a packed two-day trip, Villaraigosa said he had come to help win federal money for California’s roads, public transportation, affordable housing and schools. Earlier this month, state legislators approved a plan backed by the governor to provide $116 billion for such projects, including $37.3 billion in new borrowing that must be approved by voters in November.

Supporters hope to persuade Congress to pay for a third of the project, leaving the rest to state and private sources, said David Fleming, incoming chairman of the Los Angeles chamber.

“We’re here because we think that Los Angeles, as a national asset, should be a place for federal investment as well,” Villaraigosa said, adding that he planned to ask for federal help to improve port security when he met with Rep. Jane Harman (D-Venice) at mid-afternoon.

State bonds? Ports? The press crowd was more interested in Villaraigosa’s opinion on overhauling immigration, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and a congressional resolution stipulating that the national anthem should be sung in English. The mayor played coy -- describing himself as a mayor, “not an ambassador” -- and then held forth on the national issues in English and Spanish, as network and Univision cameras rolled.

He thinks President Bush’s immigration plan is flawed and favors proposals that are “more bipartisan, more comprehensive, more fair.” He enjoys working with the governor. As for the national anthem, it should be sung in English, he said, just as “La Marseillaise” should be sung in French.

“And I don’t think we need a resolution for that,” he said. “It’s just common sense.”

There is an increasing appetite for Villaraigosa’s brand of common sense among national political figures, who see him as an approachable leader of a city whose size and diversity lend him power.

By the time Villaraigosa catches his 5:45 flight back to Los Angeles tonight, he will have lunched with bipartisan delegations, met leaders of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, debated immigration with CNN’s Lou Dobbs and pleaded his city’s case to more than a dozen members of Congress in 20-minute one-on-one meetings.

The mayor’s philosophy on tackling Washington: “I set up as many meetings as possible in as short a period of time as possible and work diligently to develop relationships on both sides of the aisle.”

Congressional staffers from California said the approach works, with one describing the mayor as “a genuinely nice guy -- engaging and smart.” Jim Manley, a spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), called Villaraigosa, 53, “a rising star.”

On Tuesday, the mayor was invited to meet Reid on camera to discuss pending immigration legislation, then was whisked away to meet with California Sen. Barbara Boxer, who has promised to find federal money to clean up the Los Angeles River.

Boxer said her fellow Democrats were impressed with Villaraigosa when he was a speaker at a conference in Philadelphia earlier this month. His style? “Effusive.”

“He’s very enthusiastic and we really need that, the optimism that he brings. He is a can-do mayor,” Boxer said.

As a former mayor of San Francisco, California’s other senator, Democrat Dianne Feinstein, empathizes with big-city problems and met with Villaraigosa and other California mayors recently.

Villaraigosa, she said, has “a special shimmer about him that exists with how he moves, how he speaks.” His first 10 months in office, she said, have been “a brilliant honeymoon.”

In coming months, the mayor will be challenged to maintain the shimmer of his Washington profile while delivering on a list of local promises that grows by the day. But he appears headed in the right direction, Feinstein said.

“He’s got to be a mayor first,” she said. “And that’s what he does.”