Louis R. Nowell
Encyclopedia
Louis R. Nowell was a Los Angeles city fire captain who was elected to the City Council in the San Fernando Valley in 1963 and served until 1977. A conservative, he favored more growth in residential areas and opposed school busing for the purpose of racial integration. He pleaded no contest and was fined for a violation of a campaign-reporting law. He was a member of the South Coast Regional Coastal Commission,

Biography

Nowell was born February 8, 1915, in Salt Lake City, Utah
Salt Lake City, Utah
Salt Lake City is the capital and the most populous city of the U.S. state of Utah. The name of the city is often shortened to Salt Lake or SLC. With a population of 186,440 as of the 2010 Census, the city lies in the Salt Lake City metropolitan area, which has a total population of 1,124,197...

, one of twelve children in the family of Oliver and Minnie Gordon Nowell, both of Salt Lake City. His father, a blacksmith, died when Louis was ten years old, and his mother brought him and two siblings to Los Angeles in 1931. He went to Franklin High School (Los Angeles)
Franklin High School (Los Angeles)
Benjamin Franklin High School is a public high school in the Highland Park neighborhood, approximately seven miles northeast of downtown Los Angeles, California, United States...

 and to Los Angeles City College
Los Angeles City College
Los Angeles City College, known as LACC, is a public community college in the East Hollywood section of Los Angeles, California. A part of the Los Angeles Community College District, it is located on Vermont Avenue south of Santa Monica Boulevard...

, where he majored in mechanical engineering
Mechanical engineering
Mechanical engineering is a discipline of engineering that applies the principles of physics and materials science for analysis, design, manufacturing, and maintenance of mechanical systems. It is the branch of engineering that involves the production and usage of heat and mechanical power for the...

. At one point he learned the building trade and was superintendent for construction of "several hundred" homes in Hawaii. Nowell joined the Los Angeles Fire Department
Los Angeles Fire Department
The Los Angeles Fire Department is the agency that provides fire protection and emergency medical services for the city of Los Angeles....

 in 1940 and served there for 23 years, rising to the rank of captain and being elected president of the 8,500-member Fire and Police Protective League.

He was married on April 20, 1941, to Maxine Barlow of Mason City, Iowa
Mason City, Iowa
Mason City is the county seat of Cerro Gordo County, Iowa, United States. The population was 28,079 in the 2010 census, a decline from 29,172 in the 2000 census. The Mason City Micropolitan Statistical Area includes all of Cerro Gordo and Worth counties....

. They had three children, Julie, Jim and John, and since 1945 lived at 10205 Scoville Avenue in the Sunland
Sunland-Tujunga, Los Angeles
Sunland-Tujunga is a community served by two post offices in the northeasternmost corner of Los Angeles, California. Though Sunland and Tujunga began as separate settlements, they are today linked through a single police station, branch library, neighborhood council. chamber of commerce, City...

 district of the northeast San Fernando Valley
San Fernando Valley
The San Fernando Valley is an urbanized valley located in the Los Angeles metropolitan area of southern California, United States, defined by the dramatic mountains of the Transverse Ranges circling it...

..

Nowell was said to wear a "conservative label proudly." A Los Angeles Times reporter wrote of him:

Without the university degrees that open doors to executive positions, winning his way from a 65 cents a day job thinning sugar beets in Utah to election to City Council . . . is a plus in any man's memoirs.


Nowell died on July 2, 2009, in Camarillo, California
Camarillo, California
Camarillo is a city in Ventura County, California, United States. The population was 65,201 at the 2010 census, up from 57,084 at the 2000 census. The Ventura Freeway Camarillo is a city in Ventura County, California, United States. The population was 65,201 at the 2010 census, up from 57,084 at...

. but his death was not announced by his family in Los Angeles until July 23. No cause of death was given. Memorial donations were suggested to the Widows, Orphans and Disabled Firemen's Fund of Los Angeles.

Elections

See also List of Los Angeles municipal election returns, 1963 and after.

Nowell was a candidate for Los Angeles City Council District 1 in 1963 to succeed Everett G. Burkhalter
Everett G. Burkhalter
Everett Glen Burkhalter , who went by Everett G. Burkhalter, was a film studio electrician who turned to politics in 1941 and became a member of the California State Assembly, the Los Angeles City Council and the U.S. Congress in the middle part of the 20th century.-Biography:Burkhalter was born in...

; he placed second in the April primary to attorney Phill Silver. He won in the June final. He was easily reelected in 1965, but in 1969 he polled just 54% of the vote in the primary. He had a strong opponent that year in Jim Keysor, who polled 18% of the vote and went on to be elected to the State Assembly.

In 1973 he was subject to a forceful opposition campaign led by Gerald and Betty Decter (below), who sent out thousands of anti-Nowell brochures and fliers to District 1 voters. The councilman complained that "hundreds of young people" had come from outside the district to work against him. Nevertheless, Nowell won in the primary by a 54% vote.

In an emotional speech to the City Council (below, Quotations), he announced in 1976 that he would not run for reelection the next year. "His voice broke, and he appeared to be near tears." Instead, he was a candidate for city controller
Comptroller
A comptroller is a management level position responsible for supervising the quality of accounting and financial reporting of an organization.In British government, the Comptroller General or Comptroller and Auditor General is in most countries the external auditor of the budget execution of the...

 and came in third.

Highlights

  • Adobe. Nowell was named California Legislator of the Year in June 1968 by the Conference of California Societies for his "inspired leadership" in saving the historic Andres Pico Adobe in Mission Hills
    Mission Hills
    -California:* Mission Hills, California, in Santa Barbara County* Mission Hills, Los Angeles, a community within Los Angeles* Mission Hills, San Diego, an old subdivision in north-central San Diego-Elsewhere:* Mission Hills, Kansas, in Johnson County...

     from destruction. He had persuaded the City Council
    Los Angeles City Council
    The Los Angeles City Council is the governing body of the City of Los Angeles.The Council is composed of fifteen members elected from single-member districts for four-year terms. The president of the council and the president pro tempore are chosen by the Council at the first regular meeting after...

     to allocate $175,000 to buy the structure.

  • Busing. Nowell led a successful drive for the City Council to go on record in opposition to mandatory busing to achieve desegregation in city schools. The council passed the resolution by an 8-4 vote but not until Nowell and black City Councilman Dave Cunningham
    David S. Cunningham, Jr.
    David Surmier Cunningham, Jr., or Dave Cunningham, is a business executive who was elected to the Los Angeles City Council in 1973 to succeed Council Member Tom Bradley, who had been elected mayor that year...

     stood "nose-to-nose" and "appeared to verge on fisticuffs." "You are the greatest racist in this world," Cunningham shouted at Nowell during a recess in the meeting. Nowell told reporters later: "The majority of citizens—black, brown and white—don't want their children in forced busing. . . . Voluntarily, yes. Forcefully, hell no!" Mayor Tom Bradley
    Tom Bradley (politician)
    Thomas J. "Tom" Bradley was the 38th Mayor of Los Angeles, California, serving in that office from 1973 to 1993. He was the first and to date only African American mayor of Los Angeles...

     later proposed a "peace conference" between the two; Cunningham accepted but Nowell did not. The next day, Nowell proposed a motion of censure against Cunningham, which was referred to a committee when it got only three favorable votes to suspend the rules and consider it—from Nowell, Don Lorenzen and Robert M. Wilkinson
    Robert M. Wilkinson
    Robert M. Wilkinson was a political figure and lobbyist in the San Fernando Valley in California. He was a member of the Los Angeles City Council from 1953 to 1957 and from 1967 to 1979.-Biography:...

    .

  • Coastal Commission. The appointment by Council President John S. Gibson, Jr.
    John S. Gibson, Jr.
    John S. Gibson, Jr. was a powerful San Pedro, California, politician who was on the Los Angeles City Council for thirty years between 1951 and 1981. He was the president of the council for sixteen of those years and was acting mayor when the mayor was out of the city...

     of Nowell as the city's representative on the newly formed South Coast Regional Coastal Commission drew fire from conservationists. Both Gibson and Nowell had opposed the commission's formation. The City Council voted to assume authority over Nowell in casting votes on the commission, but the action was ruled invalid and unenforceable by the assistant city attorney. In one of his early votes, he came down against "the environmental side, voting against trying to stop drilling by the Occidental Petroleum
    Occidental Petroleum
    Occidental Petroleum Corporation is a California-based oil and gas exploration and production company with operations in the United States, the Middle East, North Africa, and South America...

     Corp. in Pacific Palisades."

  • Development. Nowell had a reputation as "probably the most developer
    Developer
    Developer may refer to:*Software developer, one who programs computers or designs the system to match the requirements of a systems analyst*Game developer, a person or business involved in game development, the process of designing and creating games...

    -oriented member of the City Council" in that he "persistently supported higher density development and the zoning changes necessary to achieve it both in his own district and in the city as a whole."

Decters

It was said that Nowell was led to resign from the council by the decade-long work of one husband-wife couple, Jerry and Betty Decter, who lived at 2054 North Beverly Drive in the Beverly Crest district and who first fought the councilman over his support of a 1968 plan to realign Beverly Drive
Beverly Drive
Beverly Drive is a major north-south roadway in Beverly Hills and Los Angeles.South Beverly Drive begins northbound at Harlow Avenue, a small street just north of the Santa Monica Freeway in the city of Los Angeles. It passes through the residential neighborhood of Beverlywood and intersects with...

 between the San Fernando Valley and Beverly Hills. Columnist Al Martinez of the Los Angeles Times wrote of the Decters in 1977:

With little help and with a dedication rare among private citizens, they pursued Nowell for a decade, and in the end brought him down with a series of revelations that reduced the once powerful legislator to tears. The Decters spent thousands of dollars of their own money and thousands of hours of their time to end the 14-year career of a man who had towered over civic affairs.


Colleagues said the couple "hounded Nowell into becoming a tense, distrustful and people-hating man." Council President John S. Gibson, Jr.
John S. Gibson, Jr.
John S. Gibson, Jr. was a powerful San Pedro, California, politician who was on the Los Angeles City Council for thirty years between 1951 and 1981. He was the president of the council for sixteen of those years and was acting mayor when the mayor was out of the city...

 said: "He got to dislike people. He began thinking everyone was against him and that he couldn't trust anyone." Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky
Zev Yaroslavsky
Zev Yaroslavsky is a Los Angeles County politician. He served on the Los Angeles City Council from 1975 until 1994, when he was elected to the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors. He was preceded in both offices by Edmund D...

 said: "Louie was driving himself out of office. Not a week went by that he didn't refer to the Decters." As for Nowell, he said: "I'm getting sick and tired of them picking on me."

Jerry Decter died on June 24, 2009, eight days before Nowell.

Schooner

Nowell and his family purchased a 51-foot or 57-foot schooner
Schooner
A schooner is a type of sailing vessel characterized by the use of fore-and-aft sails on two or more masts with the forward mast being no taller than the rear masts....

 named Sharolyn or Sharon in Hawaii and, with eight relatives, sailed it in 1972 from the islands to San Pedro. The 33-day crossing was rough, and most of the people aboard were seasick. The boat was out of contact for 24 days until it was sighted by a Japanese freighter, and it arrived in Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara, California
Santa Barbara is the county seat of Santa Barbara County, California, United States. Situated on an east-west trending section of coastline, the longest such section on the West Coast of the United States, the city lies between the steeply-rising Santa Ynez Mountains and the Pacific Ocean...

 with just five gallons of fuel left.

In 1974 Jerry and Betty Decter had been wondering how a city councilman could afford the cost of maintaining the schooner, and they and a colleague, Warren Kessler, found through public records that Nowell had been receiving a 50% discount in a Marina Del Rey boat slip
Slip
- In science and technology :* Slip , an aqueous suspension of minerals, and frequently deflocculant.* Slip , a positional displacement in a sequence of transmitted symbols...

  owned by a real estate developer who had received a "yes" vote from Nowell on a controversial condominium project in Long Beach. They charged that Nowell had failed to comply with the law by declaring the discount as a gift. Nowell and the developer, Jona Goldrich, denied any impropriety.

Next, the Decters checked records of the Los Angeles Harbor, where the boat had previously been docked and found that Nowell had docked it at a city pier but had not paid a cent for doing so. It was later determined by a Times investigation that Nowell had been receiving services by Harbor Department employees aboard his boat as well. He was subsequently billed $7,920 by the city, offered to settle for $480 and eventually paid $2,000.

After his retirement, he and his wife moved first to Kernville
Kernville, California
Kernville is a census-designated place in the southern Sierra Nevadas, in Kern County, California, United States. Kernville is located northeast of Bakersfield, at an elevation of 2667 feet...

 in Kern County and then to Marina Del Rey, where they lived aboard their schooner. He announced in 1980 that he was putting the vessel on the market for $170,000.

Misdemeanor

Nowell was fined $500 and placed on a year's probation in 1974 for failing to properly report $19,700 received in a fund-raising dinner aboard the Queen Mary
Queen Mary
-Monarchs:* Maria of Montferrat , queen regnant of Jerusalem, daughter of Isabella I of Jerusalem and Conrad of Montferrat and mother of Isabella II of Jerusalem...

 in Long Beach
Long Beach, California
Long Beach is a city situated in Los Angeles County in Southern California, on the Pacific coast of the United States. The city is the 36th-largest city in the nation and the seventh-largest in California. As of 2010, its population was 462,257...

 in 1972. He had listed the money in a campaign-contribution report as funds contributed by himself rather than as contributions from supporters. The original report to law-enforcement agencies had been made by Gerald and Betty Decter.

Puerto Vallarta

Betty and Jerry Decter, with Warren Kessler, asked District Attorney John Van de Kamp
John Van de Kamp
John Kalar Van de Kamp is an American politician. He served as Los Angeles County District Attorney from 1975 until 1981, and then as 28th Attorney General of California from 1983 until 1991....

 to charge Nowell and the Pacific Outdoor Advertising Company with corrupt practices for accepting room, food and beverages for him and his wife "at the fashionable Hotel Playa de Bucerias" in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. After he took the trips he voted against a city measure to control billboards. Nowell confirmed the fact and also said that Foster and Kleiser, another billboard agency, had paid the couple's air fare. He said he did not regard the payments as a bribe and that he would take such a trip again, "Only next time I'd insist that they send me to South America and make a big trip out of it instead of a little hop to Puerto Vallarta."

Quotations

• "Human beings are not going to change human beings. Only God who made us in the first place is going to be the one to change us."


• Responding to bitter personal attacks by leaders of the black community in Pacoima: "Either we are going to take care of them from the cradle to the grave or you are going to let them do their own [thing] and let a little free enterprise in. . . . Are they going to do it for themselves or leave it up to big daddy and big mommy?"


• "This so-called 'free' Washington money is nothing more than a drug which is hooking people onto federal dependency. It has made home rule by local elected officials voted into office by the people an endangered species."


• "You can call me the developer's friend any time you want to, and I don't object to that—and you can have your friends sue me. That doesn't trouble me."


• Before his 1972 sailing trip from Hawaii to Los Angeles: "All I've got to do is keep the North Star on my left and, barring the fear of passing through the Panama Canal on a foggy night, we'll hit the mainland somewhere between Anchorage [Alaska] and Santiago [Chile]."


• On being seasick: "I was over against the rail doing what I was suppose to do. She [his wife] was afraid I was going to die, and I was afraid I wasn't."


• Announcing his retirement and speaking of himself in the third person, to the City Council: "In January 1963, a fireman retired from the Los Angeles Fire Department. . . . He entered a political kitchen that gets hot. Yesterday he determined that he can stand the heat, but it is his concern for his wife, his children, his marriage and his friends. Therefore he is getting out of the political kitchen, it is his political demise. . . . I ask the City Council to adjourn and memorialize these demands and ask the clerk to send a suitable tribute of this adjournment to his wife."
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