VETO BILL BACKERS MAY HAVE NEW ALLY; STATE SENATOR OPEN TO VALLEY SECESSION.

Byline: Paul Hefner Daily News Sacramento Bureau

As lobbying on the issue intensified Tuesday, a key Senate Democrat signaled support for the effort to erase from state law the Los Angeles City Council's veto power over secession drives.

Sen. Charles Calderon, D-Montebello, said he was likely to back a bill eliminating the veto - even as Sen. Diane Watson, D-Los Angeles, predicted he would oppose it.

But Calderon said he didn't see the pending Assembly bill, AB 62, as markedly different from a measure he voted to approve in committee earlier this year. Both bills would replace the veto with a citywide vote on any secession effort.

``I think I would probably be supportive of the bill again,'' Calderon said.

As a member of the Senate's Local Government Committee - where the bill is headed - Calderon emerged as a central player in what was shaping up as a showdown over whether to restore the power of residents to vote their way out of the city.

Watson, the most vocal opponent of eliminating the veto, said she would work to kill the bill in committee. Failing that, she said she'd fight the measure on the Senate floor.

``We're putting all our forces together to kill it,'' Watson said.

Though a bill to eliminate the veto died in the Legislature last year, three measures on the issue this session each had breezed through a series of committee votes. And AB 62 won Assembly approval on a 74-1 vote.

But the climate changed Monday when state Senate President Pro Tem Bill Lockyer, frustrated that he had been unable to negotiate a compromise, announced he was washing his hands of the issue. He dropped his own bill to eliminate the veto, SB 176, and vowed to leave the debate to be decided by Los Angeles lawmakers.

``The smooth sailing is over, we can say that much,'' said state Sen. Tom Hayden, D-Los Angeles. ``It feels to me like the committee is open on the issue, and there's going to be a battle.''

While proponents of eliminating the veto view the fight as an effort to regain self-determination over local government, Watson said she sees it as the first step in splitting the San Fernando Valley away from greater Los Angeles - to the detriment of the inner city.

``You can't just opt out,'' Watson said. ``You cut off the Valley and you leave a ghetto.''

The two Republican committee members and South San Francisco Independent Sen. Quentin Kopp have all consistently backed bills eliminating the veto. As a result, the committee's Democrats - Calderon, Ruben S. Ayala, D-Rancho Cucamonga, and Patrick Johnston, D-Stockton, were likely to be the focus of the most intense lobbying efforts.

Neither Ayala nor Johnston returned calls for comment Tuesday.

A member of the Local Government Committee herself, Watson predicted she would have the votes of Calderon and Ayala. That would leave her no more than one vote short of the four needed to kill the bill.

``My goal is not to let any bill out (of committee),'' Watson said. ``Calderon, he's with us.''

But Watson appeared to have some lobbying work to do.

``It sounds like she'll be coming to talk with me,'' Calderon said.

Lawmakers backing the self-determination effort pledged an equally strong lobbying push before the committee hearing, which has not been scheduled.

``I'm going to work these guys hard,'' said Assemblyman Bob Hertzberg, D-Van Nuys, co-author of the bill with Tom McClintock, R-Granada Hills.

And Hertzberg rejected Watson's claim that a move by the Valley to break away from the city would be ``white flight.''

``Has she been to the Valley lately?'' Hertzberg said. ``This is not the Valley of 20 years ago.''

Leaders of Valley Voters Organized Toward Empowerment, which has pushed for elimination of the veto, agreed.

``She can't defend the veto, so she throws race into it,'' said Jeff Brain, Valley VOTE co-chairman. ``She's throwing other issues into it to scare people and muddy the waters. This bill is about restoring the people's right to vote.''

Brain said his group, which would meet today to discuss strategy, was capable of bringing pressure to bear on Watson as well.

``We could have Diane Watson's phone ringing off the hook all day,'' he said.

Brain also said the group would look to hold Lockyer to his pledge to get the issue resolved in the Legislature.

``If he's abandoning us because he's concerned about Diane Watson - Diane Watson is one vote - we're 1.2 million,'' Brain said. ``We're not going to forget.''

But Watson said she too wanted Lockyer's help - to get the bill defeated. And she dismissed the Valley group pushing the issue on the other side.

``It's just a small group that's been active for years,'' Watson said.