PUBLIC FORUM : PARENTS SHARE MAYOR'S VIEW OF LAUSD.

Mayor Richard Riordan is 200 percent correct about waste, corruption and excessive bureaucracy in the Los Angeles Unified School District.

When he said the school board was ``too chicken to do what is necessary'' (Daily News, Oct. 16), he was merely giving voice to all the parents who have bothered to visit the campuses, have seen what goes on there, have seen what passes for ``homework,'' and have found out, to their horror and disgust, that their children do not know who James Madison was, why we cherish democracy or how to figure the square root of 3.

Our children's consistently low scores on national and international comparison tests are not a fluke, nor were they caused by some subtle function of demographics or bad testing procedures, no matter what the school board may wish us to think.

When board member Julie Korenstein replied to the mayor's remark by saying, ``The mayor knows that it is the superintendent that does the hiring and firing,'' she unwittingly proved the mayor right.

She thereby admitted that the board is not taking control of its own business, which is to instruct its administrator to make sure that the schools are doing their best to teach students. If that does not include telling him to ferret out unnecessary labor costs and closely supervising him as he does it, then it has no meaning.

Schools worked better in the 1950s and '60s - L.A. schools were among the best in the world - because the federal and state governments did not have control, their bureaucrats did not impose a morass of red tape, and taxes went from the taxpayers to the schools, rather than on a circuitous and wasteful route through Washington and Sacramento.

Principals were more autonomous and more accountable. Teachers decided how to teach in their classrooms, and the vice principals made sure that unruly students did not disrupt classroom progress.

- Martin L. Henriks

Woodland Hills

The mayor is right on the money. The LAUSD can afford new textbooks and pay enough to attract the best teachers to work here.

He told the Daily News one way to do that is to trim the bureaucratic fat at school district headquarters. That makes sense too. The school board audit committee just heard a report from the accounting firm of KPMG Peat Marwick that said, in effect, that no one is keeping track of all those foxes they have at the LAUSD's headquarters.

I, like Riordan, believe that taxpayers want to see their hard-earned money going where it will benefit our children the most. In L.A. Unified, that means ensuring students have the best-qualified teachers in their classrooms and, as the mayor says, making sure those teachers have the resources they need to do the job, like enough textbooks.

Here's the reality: There are not enough qualified, well-trained teachers in California to meet the demand. How are we going to get the best to come to Los Angeles, how are we going to keep the great teachers we are fortunate to have now, unless we pay a competitive salary?

- Day Higuchi

President

United Teachers Los Angeles

Food bank idea

I feel every state in the United States should have a program similar to the Sharing British Columbia Program.

Sharing British Columbia is run by the British Columbia Agricultural Ministry. It is an offshoot of the Buy British Columbia Food Program. The Sharing British Columbia Program has raised more than $500,000 for food banks in just 10 months.

Bluebooks of $2 coupons are in 200 British Columbia supermarkets. Grocery shoppers tear off a coupon and have it scanned by the cashier. The $2 is added to the bill. About every two weeks, supermarkets total the coupon amounts, and local food banks are issued gift certificates in that amount. The money raised in the community stays in the community. There are no administration fees.

The only condition is that British Columbia Sharing proceeds be spent on fruit, vegetables, fish, meat

or packaged goods processed in the province.

This is a win-win situation for food banks, hungry people, farmers, shoppers and stores.

- John Hungar

Victoria, British Columbia

`AIDS and Reagan'

Re ``AIDS and Reagan,'' Public Forum, Oct 22:

When are people like Pete Morreale going to stop playing the victim? He blames the Republicans and the Reagan administration's lack of funding for the spread of AIDS.

Come on - what about a little personal responsibility? Unprotected sex and intravenous drug use are the leading causes for the spread of HIV in America. Both are caused by individual irresponsibility, not lack of funding or someone else.

- Steven Miles 

Encino

Morreale claims that ``the AIDS crisis and deaths, mostly of gay men, never warranted much attention by the Reagan administration'' and, by extension, by the Republican majority in Congress.

The amount of federal money spent on AIDS is more than 30 times that spent on heart disease when measured on a per-death basis. It is roughly 50 times the budget for research on strokes, again on a per-death basis. Heart disease and stroke are, respectively, the No. 1 and No. 3 killers of Americans, yet Morreale would rather the government continue to expend disproportionately on AIDS.

The 1999 budget for the National Cancer Institute is $2.48 billion, or $3,336 per death. The 1999 budget for the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute is $1.58 billion, or $2,982 per death. The 1999 budget for the Office of AIDS research is $1.69 billion, or $45,308 per death. These numbers are only a portion of the total federal outlays for health research.

Public health experts long ago learned how to deal with contagious, sexually transmitted diseases by using quarantines and contact tracing. This approach could wipe out AIDS in the United States in a few years were we not prevented from using it by those who place political advantage over public health.

- James F. Glass

Chatsworth

Prop. 4 makes

sense

I am voting yes on Proposition 4 on Nov. 3, and I urge all readers to follow suit.

Opponents of the measure have resorted to deception and name-calling, trying to convince sensible voters that the measure is the work of ``animal-rights extremists.'' The bottom line is that Proposition 4 simply makes sense.

Simply put, Proposition 4 bans the use of cruel, body-gripping traps, all of which kill indiscriminately and represent a danger to both protected species as well as family pets.

- Chris Rudolph

Agoura Hills

McDougal-Mehta case

In response to the Local View item in Opinions on Oct. 16 by Rubin Carson, ``McDougal-Mehta case awash in tide of splurging'':

As usual, the liberals are riding into town spewing venom at anyone who dares hold a Clinton crony accountable for any alleged wrongdoing.

So what if Nancy Mehta has more money than God to waste foolishly? That is her right. Money does not buy common sense, and it certainly does not give Susan McDougal the right to embezzle from her employer.

- Sue Johnson

North Hills

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PHOTO Richard Riordan

Called board ``too chicken''