Deukmejian Scores Some Points in Flood Zone

Gov. George Deukmejian on Tuesday announced a $115-million program of cash grants and tax breaks to help victims of Northern California’s floods--a major aid plan that clearly illustrated the political power of incumbency.

Deukmejian unveiled his flood relief program as his probable reelection opponent, Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley, was traveling through Northern California officially announcing his candidacy for governor.

Basically, Deukmejian proposed giving flood victims $5,000 in cash to supplement the $5,000 they already are entitled to receive from the federal government. In addition, the governor proposed pumping unspecified amounts of money into county disaster funds and providing income and property tax breaks for flood victims. Both the grants and the tax breaks must be approved by the Legislature, and they are expected to be.

Deukmejian also said he would press the federal government to expedite highway repairs and to encourage lending institutions to forgive late payments by flood victims.

“Even though the sun is shining,” Deukmejian told reporters, referring to the spring-like weather, “thousands of flood victims are struggling to put their lives back together.”

All during the flood emergency, which began around Valentine’s Day, Deukmejian has demonstrated how a chief executive can legitimately use the powers of his office for political gain, particularly in a genuine disaster.

He made three well-publicized visits to flood sites to talk with evacuees, granted his first-ever national television interview to discuss the flood, used the disaster as the subject of a statewide radio broadcast and even wove it into his own televised formal announcement of his candidacy for reelection. He frequently was televised being briefed by officials about his Administration’s flood-fighting efforts.

“Such are the advantages of being an incumbent--and such are the obstacles that are going to be new to Tom Bradley in this election,” observed Doug Watts, who was an adviser to Deukmejian during the 1982 gubernatorial campaign. Watts, now a private political consultant who is not involved in Deukmejian’s reelection campaign, said Bradley should try to develop a strategy designed to mitigate “the unexpected gains that Deukmejian can realize from program and policy announcements.”

But then, after thinking about the Democratic challenger’s possible options--charging “too little, too late,” “election-year politics”--the political adviser conceded: “It (the power of incumbency) is pretty difficult to defend against. . . .”

Deukmejian grinned when reporters, seated in the Governor’s Council Room, asked whether he had timed the announcement of his relief program to coincide with Bradley’s announcement of candidacy. Deukmejian said “No,” that this was not a ploy to undercut his opponent’s news coverage on one of the most important days of his campaign.

Deukmejian, still smiling, said he did not announce the program on Monday because it had not been fully developed. And he did not want to wait until today to announce it because “we wanted to get the word out to the victims.”

“These types of disasters don’t have much respect for political calendars,” he said.

Deukmejian said the $115-million cost of his program would be financed from the state’s $840-million emergency reserve. “It’s one of the reasons I insisted on having a prudent reserve as a rainy day fund--no pun intended,” he said.

The governor reported that as of Monday, the Northern California storms had resulted in 13 confirmed deaths and 67 injuries, 1,463 homes destroyed and 10,872 damaged, 185 businesses destroyed and 742 damaged, and 50,000 people driven from their homes.

The total cost of the storms so far is estimated at more than $319 million, including property losses and money spent for repairs and relief.

Although the worst seemed to be over Tuesday for flood-damaged districts of Northern California, up to four feet of Feather River water prevented about 8,000 Yuba County residents from returning to their homes in west Linda, while 55 miles to the south the San Joaquin Valley community of Thornton was still flooded by the Mokelumne River--which left another 1,300 people homeless--and another 800 or more were without homes elsewhere.

State flood control spokesman Naser Beteni said it could be several days before all residents of Linda get back into their houses and weeks before the waters are gone from Thornton.