L.A. Mayor Has Key Role in Board Race

By Kerry A. White

Los Angeles

Calls for streamlined governance and a major overhaul of the sprawling machine that is the Los Angeles Unified School District have emerged as the central issue in an increasingly heated school board race here.

And the struggle for control of the nation's second-largest district features a new and powerful player: Mayor Richard J. Riordan.

Four of the board's seven seats are up for grabs in the April 13 election. Four candidates--three newcomers and one incumbent--have been endorsed and bankrolled by a fund-raising arm put together by Mr. Riordan. The Los Angeles mayor, a lawyer and businessman with a history of involvement and philanthropy in the local schools, has long expressed frustration over what he sees as the panel's divisiveness and the slow progress for the...