Felando Challenger Struggles for Foothold by Raising Pollution Issue

The battle for the 51st Assembly District seat features a showdown between an influential Republican incumbent who easily won reelection two years ago and an underfinanced, fledgling Democratic challenger who hopes to ride a wave of concern over pollution in Santa Monica Bay all the way to Sacramento.

Already in the capital, resting comfortably with more than $150,000 in contributions, is four-term Assemblyman Gerald N. Felando. A former dentist from San Pedro, Felando wields considerable influence in conservative circles in Sacramento as caucus chairman of the Assembly’s so-called “cave-man” Republican clique headed by conservative Minority Leader Patrick Nolan (R-Glendale).

Supporters and opponents alike have described Felando as abrasive, stubborn, rude and brash. Felando, 51, who says he is none of those unless provoked, prefers to be called tenacious.

“I don’t let go,” he said in a recent interview. “I don’t take no for an answer.”

Struggling for recognition, with a campaign budget of less than $15,000, is challenger Jon Mercant, a soft-spoken attorney from Redondo Beach, who was drafted by the local Democratic Party to take on Felando.

Mercant, 35, an amateur musician who is co-founder of South Bay Concern, a fund-raising group for youth services organizations, has been active in the local peace movement. He also serves on the board of directors of CLOUT (Children’s Legislative Organization United by Trauma), an outgrowth of the McMartin Preschool molestation case. Also, he recently established the Coastal Environment Coalition to raise public awareness of environmental issues, particularly those involving Santa Monica Bay.

Opponents say Mercant is an inexperienced newcomer, too liberal for the traditionally conservative district, and lacking the political clout that Felando has garnered over eight years in Sacramento. Registered Republicans outnumber registered Democrats in the district 89,000 to 67,000.

Supporters say Mercant would make a dedicated legislator, free from the special-interest ties that they say have controlled Felando. Yet even those rallying behind Mercant say privately that his genial, noncombative style and his relatively bare campaign coffers make the task of knocking off the entrenched incumbent all but impossible.

In an interview last week, Mercant, too, was reluctant to predict victory. “Obviously as an incumbent with a lot of money, (Felando) has the big advantage,” Mercant said. “That is unfortunate.”

Also in the ring, but by his own reckoning out of the contest, is Libertarian candidate Rodney J. Dobson. A Redondo Beach resident and an engineer for Rockwell International, Dobson has collected less than $500 in contributions, which he attributes to “a feeling that a lot of people aren’t ready for what Libertarians are saying.”

Dobson, nonetheless, describes the South Bay as “a hotbed for Libertarianism” and says his goal is to educate the public about his alternative.

“The Democrats are (the big spenders) who want to control your money, while the Republicans don’t care what you do with your money, but they want to control your social responsibilities,” said Dobson, 38. “They want to tell you what you can do with your body. Libertarians are opposed to both types of control.”

While acknowledging that the odds are against him, Mercant has not given up on his second bid for the Assembly, working hard to overcome the odds by concentrating on door-to-door canvassing and grass-roots fund-raisers. In 1984, he was defeated in the Democratic primary by Doris Tate, mother of slain actress Sharon Tate, who lost to Felando in the general election by a 2-1 margin.

Mercant is focusing his campaign on what he considers to be Felando’s biggest weakness: environmental issues, particularly pollution in Santa Monica Bay. The 51st District, which includes a portion of San Pedro, the Palos Verdes Peninsula, Torrance and the beach cities, is an oceanfront district, and Mercant believes people are worried about what is happening to the area’s most precious resource.

“This district is supported tremendously by sportfishing, tourism, restaurants and other businesses related to the bay,” Mercant said. “If people can’t go in the water because of pollution, it will have a big effect on the local economy. We need to support some cleanup efforts.”

Felando supports offshore oil drilling--including placing platforms in Santa Monica Bay--and he has voted against several Democratic-led proposals to clean up the bay. The California Public Interest Research Group, which tracks legislation dealing with environmental and consumer protection matters, ranked Felando as the worst member of the Assembly on those issues last year--with a rating of 16 out of a possible 100 points.

But Felando offers no apologies for his environmental record. He said he supports offshore oil drilling because “it is one way we can get from underneath the control of the Arabs.” And, he said, he has inspected offshore oil platforms and found them to be clean and safe.

As for pollution in Santa Monica Bay, Felando said he will not vote for cleanup bills until he actually knows what needs to be cleaned up in the bay, and even then he will think twice about committing state funds. He says the problem should be corrected by what he calls the bay’s primary polluter: the city of Los Angeles and, he emphasized, its mayor, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Tom Bradley.

“I don’t think anyone wants to see our environment destroyed, but unlike Mr. Mercant, I don’t take a Sierra Club approach to environmental issues,” Felando said. “I take a common-sense approach, and I think that is very healthy.”

Their different approaches to the environment have also put Felando and Mercant on different sides of Proposition 65, the so-called toxics initiative, which would penalize private companies whose hazardous wastes end up in the water supply. Mercant supports the proposition, while Felando, calls it a perfect example of a “non-common-sense approach” to the environment.

“It gives exemptions to local government,” Felando said. “It looks like Tom Hayden and Tom Bradley wrote it themselves so they could be exempted from it.”

Mercant, however, said government “can’t be afraid of putting restrictions on toxic polluters.” He accused Felando of putting the interests of big business and big polluters above those of his constituents.

“I don’t know why he takes the positions he does,” Mercant said of Felando. “Maybe it is the business support he has from Dow Chemical, BKK and Chevron Oil.”

According to campaign contribution reports filed with the state, Felando had received a total of $3,550 from Dow, BKK and Chevron through the end of September. Felando denied that he has overlooked the interests of his district, saying he opposes Proposition 65 because it is a “ridiculous” approach to cleaning up the environment, not because of campaign contributions.

Mercant has also attacked Felando for his ties to the commercial fishing industry, which Mercant says Felando has nurtured at the expense of the hundreds of sport fishermen who live in his district. Since 1982, when statewide redistricting erased Felando’s old 52nd District from the map, the area dominated by the commercial fishing interests in San Pedro has not been included in his district. But the one-time fisherman, whose family and friends are still tied to the fishing industry, has continued to consider fishing interests one of his top legislative priorities.

“I have a tremendous amount of empathy for fishermen,” Felando said. “They have always been treated as second-class citizens.”

Felando has introduced dozens of bills on behalf of fishermen during his tenure in the Assembly, and last summer, he authored a measure that forgave half a century of never-collected state taxes owed by commercial fishing enterprises.

The tax-forgiveness measure pleased seafood wholesalers, processors and brokers, but enraged some local sport fishermen as well as some politicians in Sacramento, including Assemblywoman Doris Allen (R-Cypress), who led an unsuccessful drive to collect the back taxes.

Allen, a persistent critic of the state Department of Fish and Gamecriticized the department for supporting the tax break for commercial fishermen, while relying on license and other fees from sport fishermen and hunters to pay for more than half of the department’s annual budget.

Felando, however, says he is not unnerved by attacks on his fishing legislation, calling them politically motivated. He said he has introduced numerous bills that have assisted sport fishermen, and he defended his tax-forgiveness bill as the only fair approach to a long-forgotten tax that could have bankrupted much of the commercial fishing industry.

Next to fishing, Felando’s top legislative priority has been assistance for the elderly and developmentally disabled--one front Mercant has found difficult to criticize. Felando points proudly to a run-in he had this legislative session with the state Department of Developmental Services.

Felando introduced a bill that would have increased the rates paid by the state to charities and others who operate homes for the developmentally disabled, but the department proposed a different rate structure that Felando said would “shortchange” patients throughout the state.

Felando refused to budge, and when the legislative session ended this month, neither rate structure had been approved and $15 million in state funds for residential care facilities remained in limbo. Felando said he will try again in January.

Mercant described Felando’s support for such causes as “out of character.”

In speaking about his record, Felando also points to his efforts last year on behalf of local schools. Felando led an unsuccessful effort in the Assembly to do away with the controversial Naylor Act, which allows local governments to purchase certain surplus school property from school districts at below-market prices.

Felando, who in the past had been criticized for not supporting schools, said he intends to try again in January to get the legislation approved.

Mercant, while acknowledging that Felando has improved on education issues, said that the assemblyman reluctantly came around because of intense pressure from his constituents. Meanwhile, Dobson, the Libertarian candidate, has steered clear of most of the nitty-gritty issues in the district, preferring instead to talk about the principles of Libertarianism. Dobson favors legalizing drugs, banning taxation, removing state involvement in education and selling all parks and public property--including the beaches and Santa Monica Bay.

“Look at Disneyland,” Dobson said. “If a guy throws down a can, there is going to be someone picking it up immediately. The only way you can do that is through (private) ownership. Right now everyone owns (the bay) and everyone abuses it.”

In that vein, Dobson says he supports Proposition 61, which would put a cap on government salaries, because he said it would hasten a move toward the privatization of government.

Felando and Mercant, in rare agreement, oppose Proposition 61 because, in the words of Mercant, “it would turn California into Arkansas” by spurring a “brain drain” from the state.