Ironically, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa used to be an organizer for UTLA, and he received a $185,000 radio-ad buy from them during his successful 2005 campaign against then-Mayor James Hahn. But since then, he's made himself an enemy of the teachers union, campaigning vigorously for charter schools and raising gobs of money for reform-minded school-board members. In 2007, his Partnership for Better Schools committee raised more than $3.5 million.
His take in 2011 was smaller. The Coalition for School Reform raised more than $1.2 million, from much the same names as in 2007 — former CEO of Univision Jerry Perenchio; film producer and real estate developer Stephen Bing; and entrepreneur Philip Anschutz.
