Politics in West Hollywood Got Off to Expensive Start

Candidates in West Hollywood’s first council election spent nearly $400,000 in the turbulent three-month campaign, setting what some participants believe will be an expensive political precedent for future elections.

With several crucial financial statements still incomplete, the amount spent on the council race may well pass the $500,000 mark. “It’s an incredible amount when you realize just how small West Hollywood is,” said Ron Stone, who spent nearly $2,000--a pittance compared to the $50,000 to $70,000 spent by other candidates--as one of 40 candidates in the council race. “Some of the candidates were spending $50 a vote.” Stone lost.

Banks Montgomery, an official of Montgomery Management Co., one of West Hollywood’s most influential property owners, said he, too, expects future council campaigns to be as free-spending as the first.

“It’s not a good precedent, but unfortunately it’s one we’re going to have to live with,” he said. “There won’t be as many candidates, but they’re going to have more time to raise funds. I’ve been going to an awful lot of $300-a-plate breakfasts and $150-a-plate dinners lately. And that’s just to settle campaign debts. I hate to see what they come up with when they start raising money for the next campaign.”

Other political observers, however, expect that fewer candidates next time will lessen the need to spend freely to rise above the pack. “It was clearly an expensive race, but I don’t intend to spend that much next time around,” said Steve Schulte, who spent $66,500 and won one of five council seats.

“The costs were so high because everyone felt the need to put out a lot of literature and separate themselves from everyone else. Another thing that might cut down the amount spent is many of us learned that we just spent too much this time. It was the first time for many of us. Next time, I think we’ll know where to cut costs.”

Another $130,000 was spent by factions supporting and opposing West Hollywood’s successful incorporation campaign--figures expected to balloon further, perhaps as high as $200,000, by the time final statements are filed.

The $55,000 raised by the anti-incorporation Keep West Hollywood United campaign, which was run by Montgomery Management, was not surprising (final figures for money raised and spent by the effort have yet to be filed). But the $93,000 raised by the pro-cityhood West Hollywood Incorporation Committee--which pleaded poverty during most of the campaign--was unexpected.

Stone said much of the incorporation committee’s $93,000 came in the form of free advertising and “in-kind” contributions, unlike the $55,000 hard cash raised by Keep West Hollywood United. “We didn’t have that kind of clout,” Stone said.

But candidate Bill Larkin said the incorporation committee’s free advertising and support in Frontiers magazine (a gay weekly with pro-incorporation sympathies) was “just as effective as cold cash. They singled out me and a few others as enemies and raked us over the coals. That was just as effective as going out and raising cash. There need to be limits.”

‘Single-Issue Groups’

There may not be a single, overriding issue like incorporation in the next election, but smaller, equally partisan issues may well attract just as much money. “Once the council comes up with its rent control law and its community development plan, I think you may see some segments of the community reacting,” Montgomery said. “I think there will be a lot of single-issue groups springing up.”

Schulte and others expect that some of the sources who funded the incorporation campaign may next time support or try to defeat current council members.

But he is not as certain that campaign coffers would immediately swell by another $200,000. “I think many people who contributed to the pro- and anti-incorporation campaigns did it for a cause. I’m not so sure they’ll all be willing to give so much next time,” Schulte said.

Schulte, like a number of high-spending candidates, found himself with substantial debts by the end of the campaign. Schulte has been scheduling post-election fund-raisers to cut his $20,000 campaign debt. Council members Alan Viterbi and Valerie Terrigno, who reported lending their campaigns substantial amounts--Viterbi $24,000, Terrigno $18,000--also have been working to reduce debts.

Four Topped $50,000

Although some individual campaign reports are still not filed, statements show that at least four candidates--Schulte, Viterbi and unsuccessful candidates Bill Larkin and Scott Forbes--raised or spent more than $50,000.

Larkin, who paid out $66,881, appears to have spent the most. But Forbes, who lent his campaign at least $54,000 and has still to file a final statement, may surpass Larkin.

Final individual filings have yet to be made for council members Helen Albert and John Heilman and unsuccessful candidate Douglas Routh, who ran on the pro-rent-control Coalition for Economic Survival slate. But the coalition’s United for West Hollywood slate spent more than $47,000.

The coalition’s slate also produced a curious list of contributors. During the campaign, some of West Hollywood’s most influential property owners and developers identified the coalition as their most dire enemy.

Healing Campaign Wounds

Yet after the election, some of those same developers, including Montgomery, commercial real estate dealer Ron Kates, hotel developer Arthur Lawrence and the Pacific Design Center, contributed to the United for West Hollywood slate.

Montgomery explained the contributions as an effort to heal campaign wounds. “We did it out of good will,” he said. “All along, I said once the election was over, we wanted to try to bring people together. I think that was the basic spirit behind those contributions.”

At least one other curious alliance appears on campaign financial statements--the role of American-Oriental Limousine Services in the campaigns of unsuccessful candidates Larkin and Bernard (Bud) Siegel.

Larkin received $350 and Siegel received $500 from the limousine firm, which lists its address as 8574 W. Santa Monica Blvd.

But the only business at that address is listed as Beverly Hills Massage. When a reporter visited the address, a woman who identified herself as Tracie said the firm did not supply limousines but did give massages. The owner could not be reached for comment.

Prostitution Arrests

Capt. James Cook, commander of the West Hollywood sheriff’s station, said sheriff’s deputies have made seven prostitution or narcotics arrests at that address between 1970 and 1984, the most recent on Aug. 9, 1984.

Siegel could not be reached for comment. Larkin recalled being approached by an attorney for the limousine service who told him the firm supplied limousines to visiting Japanese businessmen. “He didn’t mention anything about a massage parlor,” Larkin said.

Viterbi said he was contacted before the election by an attorney--whose name he did not recall--who said he represented both Beverly Hills Massage and the Circus Maximus, a La Cienega Boulevard health spa raided by sheriff’s deputies last fall in a crackdown on prostitution.

Viterbi said the attorney told him the massage parlors were trying to increase their hours of operation, which had been limited by a county ordinance and upheld after a lengthy court battle, from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. Viterbi said the attorney told him the massage parlors would be willing to contribute to his campaign and could disguise their contribution on his campaign statement.

Viterbi said he turned down the contribution. “I told them I sympathized with their cause, but I didn’t want their money,” he said.