Local Elections : Mobile Home Parks Crucial in 5th : Romney, MacDonald Try to Hitch Up to Key Bloc of Voters

John MacDonald and Clyde Romney, who five months ago were bashing the name and record of county Supervisor Paul Eckert in their battle to win his job, today are fighting each other for Eckert’s supporters, who are certain to play a major role in deciding which of the men will replace the defeated two-term supervisor.

There may be no better place for MacDonald and Romney to pick up Eckert’s votes than in the dozens of mobile home parks that dot North County’s countryside and line the main streets of its cities.

In fact, if the race for supervisor had been decided in the mobile home parks alone, Eckert probably would have finished first instead of third in the June 3 primary, The Times found in a study of the primary election results.

A review of the results in 58 precincts where mobile home park residents make up a large share of the registered voters showed that Eckert finished first in those precincts, Romney second and MacDonald a close third.

In each of the district’s five cities, Eckert won a greater percentage of the vote in the mobile home precincts than he did in the cities as a whole. In the precincts studied by The Times, all of which included mobile home parks with at least 100 homes, Eckert collected 31% of the vote, Romney 26.3% and MacDonald 24.9%.

By comparison, the official primary results showed MacDonald finishing first with 29.5% of the vote, Romney second with 26.3% and Eckert third with 24.2%.

“Eckert definitely did a lot better in the mobile home parks than he did in the district as a whole,” said Nancy Allen, MacDonald’s campaign consultant. “That’s a big block of voters that’s up for grabs.”

Mobile home residents and those who have won their votes in the past say there is a lesson for MacDonald and Romney in Eckert’s success in the parks. They say he has attended to park residents’ needs during his tenure and concentrated on their votes during his campaigns.

Eckert, for example, was instrumental in the establishment of a fund to help low- and moderate-income mobile home residents buy their home sites from park landlords. He worked to eliminate paper work and regulations that were obstacles to the conversion of parks from rentals to condominiums. Eckert also helped win funding for several senior citizens’ centers and senior nutrition programs in North County.

“When Paul Eckert was running for office, he did come into the parks and he did ask for support,” said Sophie Howard, district director for the Golden State Mobilhome Owners League, a tenants’ group. “After he got there, he helped many of the people in the parks with many of their problems. This was their way of saying ‘Thank you.’ ”

Howard and other park residents said rent and rent disputes remain their primary concern. Also on the list are park conversions, park regulations and the interference of park owners in the sale of individual mobile homes. Mobile home residents are more vulnerable than other retired persons, Howard said--and more in need of government protection--because it is difficult for them to pick up and move.

“A normal renter of an apartment, if they’re unhappy, they can pack up everything and move out,” Howard said. “We can’t do that.”

Throughout their campaigns, Romney and MacDonald have stressed the importance of the senior citizen and mobile home park vote.

Both candidates have pledged to appoint a staff member to work on problems of senior citizens. Both have endorsed rent control or mediation of rent disputes as last resorts for mobile home parks. And Romney has proposed the construction of a North County regional center to centralize health and social services for senior citizens.

MacDonald and Romney are each running advertisements this week in Mobile Homes Courier, a weekly newspaper delivered to every mobile home park resident. Both have organized campaigns in at least 25 parks, lining up influential spokesmen among the residents. MacDonald has refused to accept campaign contributions from park owners.

“They are special people with special needs,” said Romney, who added that he believes the mobile home vote could prove to be the most influential single factor in the campaign. “Since there are so many parks in North County, a supervisor must be responsive to those needs if he plans to serve his constituency.”

The 5th District, which stretches from Encinitas to Orange County on the coast and inland to Borrego Springs and the Imperial County line, is home to more than 160 mobile home parks. Most of the parks are filled with retired people who have the time and inclination to immerse themselves in local politics.

“Almost every park has a little coffee klatch in the morning,” said San Marcos Councilman Corky Smith, who doesn’t live in a park but has become an ardent spokesman for their residents. “If you go and sit down and talk to them, you’ll find they solve all the problems of the world every morning.”

Oceanside Councilman Walter Gilbert, who lives in a mobile home, said park residents tend to know their neighbors better than do residents of other suburban neighborhoods.

“I spent much of my life in a stick-built home in Grand Rapids, and when I left I was only on real intimate terms with two of my neighbors,” said Gilbert, 76. “Here, I know all of them. We talk freely about matters--what their health is, those kinds of things. We know them pretty much the same as you would a member of your family.”

That kind of knowledge and trust in their neighbors makes mobile home park residents attractive to political candidates. If a candidate can cultivate a supporter who is trusted inside a park, that person can start an effective campaign and turn out dozens of residents, who are known as reliable voters.

“There’s a lot of personality in the parks,” Allen said. “If you have someone who is a leader within the park, they can do you a lot of good that goes beyond ideology. They tell their friends over bridge that they should vote for so and so, that ‘he’s my friend and you should vote for him too.’ ”

“There’s an incredible communications network inside the mobile homes,” Romney agreed.

The flip side is that without a contact inside the park, politicians can find it almost impossible to build an organization.

“You can’t just go rent a facility and say, ‘I’m here. Let’s talk,’ ” said Herb Williams, Eckert’s political consultant. “If you don’t have supporters willing to put on a party in the clubhouse, you’re relegated in the political campaign to direct mail, telephones and the media. There is nothing more effective in a mobile home park than having a few of your supporters throw a party for you and letting the people get to know you.”

Syd Notkin, who coordinated Eckert’s campaign in the parks, added: “Mobile home parks are pretty much a closed community. You can’t solicit. You can’t go door-to-door. You can’t do a whole bunch of things you can do in a normal community when you’re not surrounded by a wall and an entrance. You need some basic support. That really opens a lot of doors.”

Notkin organized his park, Madrid Manor in San Marcos, for Eckert, and Eckert finished with 72.2% of the vote in that precinct. The voter turnout in the precinct was 57.9%--about 15% higher than the district as a whole.

Eckert also ran a series of four advertising inserts in the Courier, as well as a radio commercial in which San Marcos Councilman Smith described Eckert as a friend of park residents.

The contenders for Eckert’s seat recognize the supervisor’s political gains in the parks as an achievement worth emulating.

“Paul Eckert realized early on the importance of that voting block and worked very very hard to meet the needs of mobile home park residents,” Romney said. “That was an area of real achievement for him.”