A Taxing Ambition : Conway Collis of Equalization Board Makes No Secret of His Political Desires

SACRAMENTO — Speaking to a group of county tax assessors in Oxnard recently, Conway Collis, a member of the State Board of Equalization, noted the presence of anti-tax crusader Howard Jarvis in the group.

“You are probably the only person in the state of California less popular with the assessors than I am,” Collis said to Jarvis, the co-author of the 1978 tax-slashing initiative, Proposition 13.

Then, without missing a beat, Collis said: “But I am not confident enough to take a vote.”

Which was a good thing.

One of the assessors with a good feel for the audience shouted: “You’d lose.”

The line got a good laugh, but the exchange points up the sharp differences that have developed between the Board of Equalization’s newest member and the mainstream tax establishment in California.

In Sacramento, a city filled with ambitious politicians, Collis, a Democrat from Santa Monica, is considered one of the hungriest. Even while preparing to run for a second board term in 1986, he makes no secret of his desire to one day follow his longtime mentor, Democrat Alan Cranston, to the U.S. Senate.

He has brought big-time fund raising, media hype and politics learned during eight years with Cranston to the 106-year-old Board of Equalization, a powerful agency that adjudicates tax disputes and administers property tax law.

The changes have not been without controversy. In two years on the board, his first elected office, Collis:

- Was fined $12,000 by the state Fair Political Practices Commission for inflating campaign finance reports in what the FPPC said was an attempt to scare away potential challengers, a charge that Collis denies. He admits only to “sloppy reporting.”

- Publicly apologized to San Francisco Assessor Sam Duca for issuing an inflammatory press release publicizing an audit of Duca’s operation although the audit later found nothing amiss.

- Reimbursed the state after running up a phone bill raising money for Cranston’s unsuccessful 1984 presidential campaign.

- Drew criticism for two votes on the board that helped politically influential taxpayers whose attorneys had made financial contributions to his campaign.

Collis, who represents a typically large equalization district, running from West Los Angeles to San Francisco, concedes he has made some mistakes. He attributes them to his maturing process as an elected official.

But he strongly disputes that some of the criticisms are valid, denying, for instance, any connection between his votes on two assessment appeal cases and contributors. One case involved the Irvine Co. and the other evangelist Robert Schuller’s Crystal Cathedral, both in Orange County.

He received $2,000 in contributions from attorneys at the law firm that represented both Irvine Co. and Crystal Cathedral. He said both cases, which received identical 3-2 votes of the board, were decided on merit.

Collis lays much of the blame for the controversies on a running feud he has been having with old-guard board member William M. Bennett, a gray-haired, peppery, 14-year veteran with a penchant for publicity himself.

Collis said: “This really relates to a Board of Equalization dispute over the direction of the Board of Equalization. I believe it should be an ombudsman in the tax area--not merely a tax collector,” he said.

Cranston Fund-Raiser

A media-wise, new-school politician who earned a reputation as a skilled fund-raiser on Cranston’s Senate reelection and ill-fated presidential campaigns, Collis represents some clear contrasts to Bennett, a Kentfield attorney once described by a colleague as “a brilliant legal mind connected to a hell of a loud mouth.”

Collis frequently refers to a generation gap on the board, drawing attention to age differences--he is, at 37, the youngest member while Bennett, 67, is the oldest.

He also calls himself “a friend of the taxpayer,” conjuring up in speeches and interviews old tax-collector stereotypes of insensitive government bureaucrats out to wring every dollar they can from taxpayers.

That approach angers other elected tax officials, who find fault with Collis because they consider him too political and dislike his attempts to raise the board’s--and his own--profile.

While the board is the nation’s only constitutionally empowered body of elected tax officials, it has never been considered overtly political. None of the four members directly elected to the board is well known politically. The other members, in addition to Collis and Bennett, are Richard Nevins and Ernest J. Dronenburg Jr. The fifth seat on the board is held by Controller Kenneth Cory.

Most Stay Elected

Traditionally, once elected, board members stay elected. It is said that the massive size of the districts, each of which contains about a quarter of the state’s voters, and the low profile of the officeholders make it difficult for challengers to mount campaigns against them.

Collis succeeded George R. Reilly, who served 44 years, then suffered a stroke and went directly from his office to a nursing home, where he remains today. In the history of the board, 11 incumbents have died in office, while only four are known to have been defeated for reelection.

Bennett, although he once ran for statewide office and loves headlines as much as Collis, is old school. He prides himself with never having accepted a campaign contribution and, like many other elected tax officials, considers himself more an expert at the intricacies and complexities of property assessment and administrative law than winning elections.

He believes strongly that board members cannot raise substantial amounts of money without putting themselves in conflict with tax issues raised before the board. “There is no person alive who is not influenced by a gift,” he said during a recent interview, adding that Collis seemed too hungry. “If the Supreme Deity were an office, he’d be running for that,” he said.

Common Suspicion

Interviews with several county assessors revealed that they held a common suspicion of any tax official who has sights on a higher office.

“Assessors never get elected to higher office. We are in the tax-collecting business, and nobody likes to pay taxes. It is one of the most negative offices to run for,” said one prominent assessor, who asked not to be identified because he said he did not want a public fight with Collis.

Sacramento County Assessor William C. Lynch, a highly vocal critic of Collis, said 57 of the state’s 58 assessors opposed Collis on a vote changing property assessment practices in a way said to favor Irvine Co. “I think his position is political rather than technical,” said Lynch, who summed up the common way assessors see their offices: “My job is one requiring a technical ability rather than a political ability.”

Collis, while not denying his political aspirations, thinks the old guard is wrong. He claims that taxpayers don’t get a fair shake under the present system.

“The whole process is stacked against the taxpayer. There is a tendency to dismiss honest taxpayers with people who have been dishonest without even listening to them,” he said in an interview. “The board rules against taxpayers 87% of the time, and nobody is right 87% of the time. The board should have a cooperative rather than adversarial relationship with the taxpayers.”

Activities in Office

Since taking office, he has scheduled regular office hours throughout his district, issuing public invitations to disgruntled taxpayers. He has pushed for conformity between federal and state income tax returns, enthusiastically embraced the tax amnesty program and wants to cut the sales tax while raising liquor and cigarette taxes.

Collis, who narrowly defeated a former assemblyman four years ago, is thinking beyond his reelection campaign next year. “Politics is like business. You do a good job and you get promoted,” he said.

His goal of reaching the U.S. Senate--the path may include a race for a statewide office, such as controller, if one opens up--is not new. Fifteen years ago, hoping to impress admissions officials at the Stanford University School of Law, Collis wrote: “Initially, I plan to run for a state office, moving up to the national level as quickly as possible.”

The law school, which had rejected him once, let him in, though that may have been due more to his characteristic tenacity than the letter. Collis said that after he was rejected he moved to Palo Alto and hounded school officials until they were forced to admit him.

Hero Is ‘Rocky’

Collis, whose late father had a career as a vaudeville song-and-dance man, believes eventually he will win acceptance. A weightlifter and karate expert, he said he identifies with the movie hero “Rocky.” Married to Margaret S. Henry, president of the Women Lawyers Assn. of Los Angeles, the couple have a year-old son, Everett, whom they nicknamed Rocky.

“I am aggressive, and sometimes people are uncomfortable with that, but over time they get comfortable with me,” he said.

To help matters along, Collis issues a lot of press releases, including a four-page single-spaced outline of New Year’s resolutions and accomplishments that he mailed in January.

“One doesn’t enter politics to operate secretly,” he said.