LA Mayoral Election Profile: Jan Perry
LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — No matter how next month's mayoral election turns out, Jan Perry is leaving her political future in the hands of a higher authority.
KNX 1070's Charles Feldman reports Perry is among the major candidates campaigning to succeed Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.
LA Mayoral Election Preview: Jan Perry
If Los Angeles City Councilwoman Jan Perry gets to City Hall, she would not only be the first female mayor of Los Angeles, but also the first Jewish one: she is African-American and converted decades ago to the Jewish religion.
So, it should not be too much of a surprise to learn what she might do should she not win the office.
"I'm a spiritual person," said Perry. "I might study to become a Rabbi."
If elected, Perry has pledged to work immediately on two specific issues on her agenda to right the city's fiscal ship.
"The hardest thing to do is to ask our employees - to compel our employees - to come back to the table and give on their health care costs and their pension costs to the same level that police and fire do," Perry said. "I want all of our collective bargaining to reach that standard."
Perry said she would also look at ways to revamp the Convention Center to bring more business to downtown Los Angeles.
"That is an asset that we own, we have the potential for getting a new stadium and bringing in new revenue from that and developing an overall campus," said Perry. "It presents an opportunity for us to change the management of that campus and get more Convention Center business - less trade shows, more conventions, so that we generate hotel nights, restaurant activity, that social life that comes along with large scale conventions coming into an area."
Perry added such an effort would center on "leveraging that asset for a higher and better use through a public/private partnership."
