Election Opponent Criticizes Wieder at Board Meeting

One of Harriett M. Wieder’s opponents in the 42nd Congressional District showed up Wednesday on her turf--a meeting of the Orange County Board of Supervisors, which she chairs--to accuse her of overseeing “the Los Angeles-ization of Orange County.”

The attack by Andrew Littlefair, which came while the board was considering six developer agreements, spurred three of Wieder’s colleagues to close ranks around her.

Supervisor Roger R. Stanton asked Littlefair--Stanton kept misstating his name as Littlefield--where he was during the “Los Angeles-ization of Los Angeles.” A Torrance resident, Littlefair had not lived in the 42nd District, which straddles Orange and Los Angeles counties, for seven years. Most of that time he spent as an advance person for President Ronald Reagan.

“I won’t apologize for that,” said Littlefair, who has portrayed himself in the campaign as the keeper of the Reagan flame.

Another board member, Gaddi H. Vasquez, accused Littlefair of sensationalizing the growth figures he cited. And a third board member, Thomas F. Riley, angrily accused Littlefair of making a political speech and urged County Counsel Adrian Kuyper to rule Littlefair out of order. Kuyper asked Littlefair to stick to the subject.

Meanwhile, Wieder watched the scene with amusement. “Thanks for your time,” she said sweetly to Littlefair when it was over. The board went on to approve the developer agreements.

Less than an hour later, Wieder and Littlefair arrived late for a candidates’ forum before Republican women from Los Alamitos and Seal Beach. Wieder, who is from Huntington Beach, is the front-runner in the June 7 primary for the heavily Republican district.

The earlier incident was not mentioned until afterward, however, when Wieder, obviously peeved at Littlefair, told him, “You made a fool of yourself” before the board.

When Littlefair, 27, started to respond, Wieder silenced him. “Grow up,” said Wieder, who is 40 years his senior.

Littlefair explained later that as he walked precincts in Orange County as part of his campaign, it became clear that traffic congestion and growth were the issues of most importance to voters.

“It’s a lot closer to the surface than I thought it was,” Littlefair said. “So we went down today to let our views be known.” He added, “Harriett represents special interests on this issue.”

“I’m not afraid of them,” Littlefair said of the supervisors. “What we went down there to say is, ‘You should be letting the people’s voice be heard on this.”