FLUSHING OUT SCHOOL PROBLEMS CITY TO SEND INSPECTORS TO LAUSD RESTROOMS.

Byline: Michael Gougis Staff Writer

City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo's crusade to clean up dirty toilets in public schools got a boost Tuesday from a key City Council committee despite heated protests from Los Angeles Unified officials.

In response to longstanding complaints that many school bathrooms and cafeterias are unsanitary, the council's Budget and Finance Committee voted 4-1 to send a team of inspectors onto a handful of campuses to review health and safety conditions as part of a pilot program.

The program will target five schools and determine whether wider inspections are warranted - something Delgadillo suggested would be necessary.

``We need an open-book policy. Independent, surprise inspections are essential to the credibility of the report,'' Delgadillo said.

LAUSD Superintendent Roy Romer hotly opposed the move, arguing that it would do nothing more than give the district's critics more opportunities to turn school bathrooms into political issues.

``I have seen the politics in this town,'' Romer said. ``The temptation is too great for an elected official ... to make a press event over a dirty bathroom.''

Councilwoman Cindy Miscikowski was the only member who voted against the plan. ``If we're going to do this, why not send inspectors into five of our parks, or five of our Housing Authority facilities?''

The City Attorney's Office and the Building and Safety department will develop standards for inspecting a wide range of health and safety standards for the schools. In addition to bathrooms and cafeterias, inspectors will also look at schools' earthquake readiness.

``This is an opportunity to prove what is really going on in the schools,'' committee chairman Bernard Parks said.

The program will not cost any money because existing inspectors will be reassigned to the five schools, which have not been identified yet.

After 60 days, results of the program will be evaluated. Building and Safety and the city attorney also will make recommendations to the board as to what to do with the results of the investigations.

At issue is the cleanliness and accessibility of the district's 7,129 restrooms. Nearly a year ago, television station KCBS-TV Channel 2 broadcast a report that showed filthy conditions in school restrooms.

In response, school officials announced in February that they were dedicating an additional $11 million to the district's existing $10 million bathroom maintenance program.

In June, school officials released the results of their own bathroom inspections conducted between September 2002 and June 2003, showing that only 3 percent of the district's restrooms were in good condition and that 42 percent were in poor shape.

A follow-up inspection in November, which concentrated on the poor restrooms, showed that 24 percent remained in poor shape. County officials already have approved development of a pilot program to conduct surprise health inspections of restrooms, cafeterias and earthquake preparedness in 1,530 schools within the county's unincorporated areas.

The county inspectors are scheduled to report back to the Board of Supervisors in mid-December, when officials will decide the future of the estimated $719,000 annual program.

Bathroom cleanliness has been a contentious issue on several fronts for the school district this year. Board members say they want to make individual school inspection reports - available online when they are not being revised or updated - more accessible to the public. But a resolution to do just that was pulled from a board meeting last week pending further review.

Michael Gougis, [phone]

michael.gougis(at)dailynews.com

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Photo:

Principal Rosalba Manrique uses an hot-air hand dryer in a girls' restroom at Fair Avenue Elementary School. The schools to be investigated by the city have not been disclosed.

Tina Burch/Staff Photographer