Good Riddance to Bad Politics

Last Tuesday’s general election in Orange County is history, and we suspect most residents are glad of it. Before the polls opened many people seemed tired of the mudslinging campaigns that concentrated more on personal attacks than on serious discussions of real issues.

And that was not just in the U.S. Senate and gubernatorial races. Some Orange County campaigns were nasty, too. Example: Santa Ana City Council candidate Miguel Pulido Jr. sent out a couple of last minute hit-mailers, one to women voters accusing his opponent of beating his former wife and another targeted to Anglos that angered Latinos by classifying illegal residents as “a public nuisance.” Pulido won the election, but he lost some followers and their trust with his campaign tactics.

Other races for congressional seats and the county Board of Supervisors were also short on issues and long on personal attacks. That may have had something to do with the overall poor turnout on Election Day. Only about 59% of the county’s registered voters bothered to go to the polls, the lowest number in decades. Better candidates and cleaner campaigns could help generate greater voter interest.

One trend evident again in Tuesday’s elections is voter support for banning all fireworks. The question of whether to prohibit the sale, possession and use of fireworks, except for public displays, was before voters in Anaheim and Yorba Linda. Residents in both communities solidly approved the ban.

In Anaheim the measure now becomes law. The Yorba Linda vote was only advisory, but with 67% of the city’s voters supporting the measure, the council should waste no time becoming the ninth city in the county to ban fireworks.

Other cities should take the cue and enact a fireworks ban, too. Each time one does, it reduces the risk of needless and avoidable injury, death and property loss caused by fireworks of all kinds, the legal as well as illegal ones.

Anaheim and Yorba Linda submitted the question to voters. They didn’t have to. Elections may be politically expedient in some cases, but it’s a time-consuming approach that involves needless costs. City councils could, and should, do what Irvine did several weeks before the general election. Acting in the interest of public safety, the Irvine City Council outlawed fireworks.

If all 26 cities in the county took that approach it would be far easier to control the hazards fireworks pose. In 1980, it took the largest fire in Tustin’s history to prompt that city to ban fireworks. In Anaheim, a fire last July 4 that burned out 94 apartments and left hundreds of people homeless was the spark for last Tuesday’s ballot measure and vote banning fireworks. Other cities shouldn’t wait for a similar tragedy to spark them into action.