O’Connor Describes Her Victory as ‘Unique Mandate’ From Voters

Hailing her 59.6% victory in Tuesday’s primary as a “unique mandate . . . for any big-city mayor,” San Diego Mayor Maureen O’Connor predicted Wednesday that her convincing reelection will bolster her clout within City Hall as she works to fashion a political legacy over the next 4 1/2 years.

An ebullient O’Connor, savoring the one-sided victory that made her only the fourth San Diego mayor to be reelected outright in the primary, spent much of Wednesday relishing that footnote in local political history even as she began mapping out some broad goals for her next term.

“What the people have said, and said very loudly . . . is, ‘Yes, mayor, we like your style, we like your style of leadership,’ ” O’Connor said in an interview in her City Hall office. “This is a very big gift they’ve given me.”

Margin of Victory

Final unofficial returns from Tuesday’s primary showed that O’Connor received 124,222 votes (59.6%), easily surpassing the majority needed to avoid a November runoff while outdistancing her nearest rival in the five-candidate field by a better than 3-to-2 margin. Former San Diego City Councilman Floyd Morrow, O’Connor’s only major opponent, drew 69,974 votes (33.5%), while the three minor candidates on the ballot--businessman Charles Ulmschneider, semi-retired public relations official John Kelley and City Hall gadfly Rose Lynne--were distant also-rans, receiving 6.9% among them.

Although O’Connor’s vote percentage was the highest in a mayoral race since Pete Wilson’s 62% in 1979, many within political circles had predicted, in light of the relatively weak opposition facing her, that she would win by an even wider margin. The fact that more than 40% of the San Diego voters who went to the polls Tuesday voted against O’Connor, some argued Wednesday, offered evidence against the mayor’s self-described “mandate.”

“Given the nature of the race, it’s definitely not a mandate,” political consultant David Lewis said. “My definition of a mandate is over 70%. I consider anything over 60% to be a substantial victory, and anything below 60% shows that there are some problems. With apologies to Floyd, I think the 34% that he got is a protest vote reflecting some rather strong dissatisfaction with O’Connor.”

Morrow described the votes that he received as being “more positive for me than negative for her”--an analysis colored, perhaps, by his pride over substantially improving upon his 19% third-place finish in the special 1986 mayoral race won by O’Connor.

However, Morrow was more willing to view the 14,407 votes drawn by the three minor candidates as a protest against O’Connor, and noted that 11,235 of the 219,838 San Diegans who went to the polls did not bother to vote in the mayoral race. Morrow pointed out that O’Connor’s vote represented only about 24% of San Diego’s 521,328 registered voters.

‘Looks Pretty Silly’

“Anyone who calls numbers like that a mandate looks pretty silly,” Morrow said. “Frankly, when you consider the powers of incumbency, how little I spent and how little coverage this race got, she should have gotten 80%.”

O’Connor, though, expressed “absolute satisfaction” with the result, going so far as to describe her nearly 60% vote total as “a little remarkable . . . when you look at the total picture.” A significant part of that picture, from O’Connor’s perspective, is the fact that several potentially strong opponents--among them, County Supervisor Susan Golding and City Councilman Ed Struiksma--opted not to run.

“So the strength was shown right at the beginning,” O’Connor said. “There’s always a protest vote. You have to remember that I am a woman Democratic mayor in a conservative Republican town. And I also am a mayor that basically, even by the president of the Chamber of Commerce’s own admission, is kind of anti-establishment.

“Plus, I didn’t shy away from anything, I had a fairly controversial agenda in the first 20-plus months. If you take a look at most mayors, they wait to bring up any issue until they’re secure. Pete Wilson didn’t have the growth-management plan on the table until 1979, clear into his second term. And I limited the number of building permits issued in the first 20 months . . . . We didn’t sweep the sewage issue under the rug and put the Gann waiver on the ballot last November.”

Councilman Bruce Henderson concurred with O’Connor, noting that the mayor, who spent only about $70,000 in the primary, “probably could have gotten 70% if she had spent $250,000”--as she did two years ago.

“I think it’s more important that Maureen made a good statement to other politicians that these huge amounts of money don’t have to be spent in campaigns,” Henderson said. “As far as the public’s concerned, I think people just decided they were sufficiently satisfied with Maureen that they saw no reason to extend the debate.”

Although O’Connor already enjoys a generally good working relationship with most of the council, she argued Wednesday that her victory could strengthen her hand in dealings with the council.

“I’m working with a council that by and large did not support me for mayor,” O’Connor said. “But I think that the city is supporting the mayor and my agenda, and I think you’re going to see them settle down now since it’s 4 years and 6 months as opposed to, ‘Will she or won’t she be here?’

“On the growth issue, they may sober up a little bit and understand that this community is serious, so I think they’re going to move more toward my position, which I think is more reflective of the community than the present City Council.”