Mayor Tops Governor’s Campaign Spending

Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley’s election campaign collected and spent more money than Gov. George Deukmejian’s reelection committee over the past two months as they launched a barrage of radio and television commercials at one another, campaign finance statements filed Friday disclosed.

However, the filings showed that the Republican governor still has a much larger bankroll than his Democratic challenger as the candidates look beyond the June 3 primary to their likely rematch in the November election.

Deukmejian reported $4.92 million available as of May 17, the end of the reporting period, contrasted with $386,000 for Bradley.

During the period, Bradley spent $1.40 million, contrasted with Deukmejian’s $1.14 million. The reports showed Deukmejian collecting $714,000, bringing his total for the campaign to more than $8 million, while Bradley collected $788,000, for a total of $2.3 million.

Final Report

The reports were the last to be filed until after the primary.

Meanwhile, in other heavily contested campaigns, Assemblyman Gray Davis (D-Los Angeles) far outdistanced his two rivals for the Democratic nomination for state controller by spending nearly $1.4 million in the past two months. On the Republican side, Sen. William Campbell of Hacienda Heights took in less than half the amount raised by Davis but was far ahead of his two opponents in both spending and fund raising.

In the Republican primary race for lieutenant governor, the fund-raising ledgers of former Lt. Gov. Mike Curb and Sen. H. L. Richardson of Glendora were more closely matched. But Curb held a decided edge in the spending category, buying almost $800,000 worth of television time.

In the gubernatorial race, Deukmejian continued to receive strong financial support from his traditional sources, including agricultural firms, banks and investment companies, developers, the waste disposal industry and the California Armenian community.,

Biggest Contributor

The governor’s biggest contributor, with donations totaling $106,475 in the past two months, was Western Growers Political Action Committee, the political arm of a trade association that includes the state’s biggest producers of fresh fruits and vegetables.

“We have contributed because he is willing to consider the interests of the fresh produce industry in the state,” association spokeswoman Barbara Buck said. “We have had a difficult time getting the attention of former governors, but Gov. Deukmejian has shown a willingness to treat the industry fairly.”

Few issues in the campaign have been as bitterly contested as that of toxic waste cleanup, with Bradley accusing Deukmejian of accepting large contributions from polluters. While disputing the criticism, the governor’s campaign committee has continued to accept donations from companies involved in waste disposal and toxics cleanup, including $5,000 from Chemical Waste Management Inc. of Newark, Calif.; $2,000 from American Disposal Inc. of Gardena, and $2,500 from R. E. Wolfe Enterprises, a Kansas City-based firm that operates landfills in San Bernardino County and was the main contractor on a major toxic dump cleanup operation in Los Angeles.

Other Contributors

Other major contributions to the Deukmejian campaign included $15,000 from the California Correctional Peace Officers Assn.; $10,000 from the Security Pacific Corp.; $10,000 from Columbia Savings and Loan; $10,000 from Alpha Omega Development Corp. of Manhattan Beach; $10,000 from the California Medical Assn.; $10,000 from Computer Sciences Corporation, an El Segundo firm that runs the state’s Medi-Cal billing program, and $10,000 from Drexel Burnham Lambert Inc., a New York-based investment banking firm.

In the same two-month period, Bradley drew his support from a similar wide range of sources, including labor groups, developers and investment bankers, as well as a long list of Hollywood celebrities and sports figures.

Bradley’s largest single contribution was $15,000 from National Medical Enterprises Inc. of Los Angeles, a nationwide health care chain. He also received $10,000 from C-PAC, the campaign committee of Los Angeles City Councilman Dave Cunningham.

The First Boston Corp. of New York, which underwrites municipal bonds, gave $6,000 to the Bradley campaign; another New York underwriting firm, Kidder, Peabody & Co., donated $10,000.

Celebrity Backers

Among the celebrities who backed Bradley were Sammy Davis Jr., $4,100; ex-Laker Jamaal Wilkes, $3,500; Gene Autry, $3,500, and television and film producer Norman Lear, $3,500.

In the GOP primary race for lieutenant governor, Curb and Richardson each raised just over $500,000 during the past two months. Curb supplemented this with $200,000 in loans from executives of two Los Angeles-area businesses, Harry Cooper of Caltex Enterprise Inc., and Frank E. Raper of United Packaging Corp.

The winner of that contest will face incumbent Democratic Lt. Gov. Leo McCarthy, who is unopposed in the primary and has amassed a $703,000 campaign war chest.

One of the Republican Party’s most prodigious fund-raisers, Curb began the race with about $400,000 in the bank, enabling him to spend $900,000 this year, considerably more than Richardson. Of that, almost $800,000 has gone for television commercials.

Curb’s largest individual contributions during this period came from the construction industry, with $40,000 contributed by the William Lyon Co. and $25,000 from Donald M. Koll, chief executive officer of the Koll Co. Other large contributors included industrialist Leonard Firestone, who gave $10,000.

Opposes Gun Control

While Richardson began the year with far less than Curb, about $12,000, he still was able to build a campaign chest large enough to spend more than $700,000. Thus far, however, Richardson has reported spending less than $200,000 on television commercials, the rest of it going to pay expenses for fund-raisers and campaign travel.

Richardson, who built a powerful political organization around his opposition to gun control, received $25,000--his largest single contribution during this period--from the National Rifle Assn.’s Political Victory Fund. The Washington-based organization previously contributed $10,000 to his campaign.

In the Democratic primary race for controller, Davis showed his fund-raising skills by taking in more than $925,000 in the past two months alone.

Having begun the race with about $1.1 million in the bank, Davis spent relatively little until the past few weeks when he dumped nearly $1.2 million into a television blitz. His spending was bolstered by a $400,000 loan guaranteed by several major Democratic financiers.

TV Ads Target Foe

Sen. John Garamendi of Walnut Grove, who early in the campaign unleashed a series of television ads targeting Davis, has spent $765,000 on the race thus far, most of it for his television ads. In total, Garamendi raised nearly $900,000 in the campaign, $365,000 of it in bank loans.

He ended the period with about $122,000 in the bank, far less than Davis’ nearly $500,000.

Assemblyman Alister McAlister of Fremont, the third Democrat in the race, raised about $139,000 in this period and spent about $170,000 overall, mostly on a novel radio commercial that features the voice of a Randy Newman sound-alike. McAlister, who chairs the Assembly’s Finance and Insurance Committee, raised nearly all his money from financial institutions and insurance companies.

On the Republican side, Campbell far outdistanced his two opponents by raising a total of $580,000 this year. Records show he has spent $549,000 of that, almost all on television advertising.

Assemblyman Don Sebastiani of Sonoma, who is in a tight race with Campbell, spent $131,600 in the past two months, far less than than Campbell.