John Ferraro had many friends. This was his strength and his weakness. He stuck up for people he liked, even when it turned out they did not have the city’s best interests at heart. In his more than 35 years on the City Council, however, it‘s fair to say Ferraro did more to keep Los Angeles together than anyone but longtime rival Tom Bradley.What Ferraro mostly did for the past 14 years was steer the City Council from the president’s chair. He saw the city through rough times into half-a-dozen years of fiscal decline, followed by recovery, through a devastating riot and a major earthquake. He did this for the most part with decorum and fairness, even when the discussion was heading in directions he opposed — Councilman Marvin Braude‘s early-1990s anti-smoking ordinances, for instance, about which Ferraro left his chair to comment spitefully.
Source: Old-School Star | L.A. Weekly