‘He Gives Us Accessibility’ : Special-Interest Groups Stand by Mayor

Members of homosexual, black, Latino, neighborhood, environmental and labor groups--constituencies on which Mayor Roger Hedgecock has depended for political power--said Thursday they will remain loyal to the mayor, who continues to be their strongest hope to have a hand in city government decisions.

They said the likelihood of Hedgecock standing trial once more on felony conspiracy and perjury charges will not erode his appeal, although others claim it will erode his effectiveness as a city leader.

“He’s still the mayor, the door is still open,” said Jay Powell, conservation coordinator for the local chapter of the Sierra Club. “We still have an agenda to move and we’re going to continue to do that.”

Powell said the Sierra Club has not even considered the possibility that Hedgecock could leave office, either through resignation or felony conviction. Instead, the club has taken Hedgecock’s stunning reelection victory in November as a sign that San Diegans are more worried about environmental concerns than the mayor’s tangle with the law.

As a result, the club this week launched a petition drive for a “controlled-growth initiative,” which would put before San Diego voters every decision to open up land for development in the northern part of the city. Powell said the mistrial declared Wednesday in Hedgecock’s first criminal trial will not derail the petition drive.

Other adamant support for Hedgecock came from Joseph Francis, executive secretary-treasurer of the San Diego-Imperial Counties Labor Council of the AFL-CIO, and from the Rev. Robert Ard, president of the San Diego Black Leadership Council.

Francis said there is no “change or erosion” of labor’s support for Hedgecock.

And Ard vowed that if Hedgecock would continue to “hang in there and fight . . . I’ll be in the churches, fighting for him.”

“Hedgecock is representative to me of a climate that we can work (within) in the city,” Ard said. “He gives us accessibility. We aren’t excluded or ignored.”

Ard said the mayor clung to his support in the black community by continuing to show up at nighttime community meetings and even taking his lunch time during the recently completed trial to make a short appearance during the community’s Martin Luther King Day celebration.

Likewise, Hedgecock has cemented his alliance with the Latino community by appointing its members to city boards and committees, according to Tony Valencia, president of the Mexican and American Foundation.

Valencia said Hedgecock was instrumental in having insurance man Oscar Padilla appointed to the stadium authority and businessman Mateo Camarillo appointed to the citizens group overseeing construction of the convention center.

In addition, Hedgecock, who failed to get restaurateur Ralph Pesqueira appointed to the San Diego Unified Port District commission, is pushing Pesqueira for a post on the Planning Commission, Valencia said.

Valencia said Latinos and others in the mayor’s coalition will continue to back Hedgecock because, in part, of the fear that City Hall will be “back to the old exclusionary process” that shuts out minorities from decision-making.

Valencia also said the coalition drawn together by Hedgecock could survive even if its creator is deposed.

“I think the coalition is going to remain intact if Mayor Hedgecock is not the personality who will administer City Hall in the future,” he said. “The coalition will stay intact and go for another candidate.”

The search for alternatives to Hedgecock may already be under way, said Brad Truax, past president of the San Diego Democratic Club, a predominantly homosexual organization. Truax compared Hedgecock to a king locked in “check” in a political chess game.

“I don’t think that anybody in Roger Hedgecock’s coalition is foolish,” said Truax. “They are looking at others who should be supported.

“At the same time, Roger should continue to lead the city and continue to fight what I feel is a politically motivated vendetta against him. I can’t predict if he’ll survive or not, but I’m hanging in there with him.”

That kind of loyalty is expected to continue as long as Hedgecock and his staff continue to tend to the needs of the various groups under his wing, despite the debilitating legal problems.

“I called up there (the mayor’s office) the other day and asked for assistance, and the mayor’s office responded instantaneously,” said Steve Temko, a Normal Heights community leader.

“As long as he keeps responding to people’s needs, the coalition exists.”