Local Elections : Mailers Become New Issue in Santa Monica Council Race

In the waning days of any election campaign, things can get rough and rambunctious.

Although Santa Monica has not descended to the level of some state and national campaigns, the fur, as one observer put it, has begun to fly.

Opposing camps in the City Council race this week accused each other of using deceptive and perhaps dishonest campaign literature.

Blow to Faction

And, in a blow to one faction’s campaign, a key endorsement mailer, linked to an influential Westside Democratic political machine, will not back all of the group’s candidates.

Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights, the city’s dominant political faction, is running a slate of four candidates, led by incumbent Dennis Zane. On the other side, Councilman Herb Katz heads a field of largely independent candidates.

In all, 13 people are competing for four seats on the 7-member body. Santa Monica’s estimated 59,000 registered voters can mark ballots for up to four candidates in the Nov. 8 election, a contest expected to shift the balance of power at City Hall.

Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights (SMRR) came under fire from opponents after mailing out a card that touted endorsements by the Santa Monica Police Officers’ Assn.

On one side of the card, three of the tenant faction’s candidates who received the Police Officers’ endorsement are pictured and named in big blue letters with the label, “The Crime Fighting Team.” The fourth recipient of the police endorsement, rival candidate Herb Katz, is not mentioned.

On the reverse side, the blue lettering is continued, along with pledges about what the “Crime Fighting Team” has done and will do to build up the police force and battle crime.

Along the foot of the card are the names of the three Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights candidates who received the endorsement--Zane, Judy Abdo and Paul Rosenstein--and the fourth member of the slate, Ken Genser, who did not receive an endorsement. Asterisks are placed by the three who received the police approval, with small lettering indicating that those with the asterisks received the endorsement. No asterisk appears by Genser’s name.

Opponents of the tenant faction attacked the mailer as deceptive, saying it creates an impression that Genser, not Katz, received the fourth Police Officers’ endorsement--an endorsement that politicos on all sides agreed is valuable.

Campaigners for Katz charged that the police had been used and that this type of mailer is the expected but undesirable product of slate politics.

Defends Mailer

But Genser and the campaign manager for Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights, Thom Poffenberger, said the mailer was fair and clear in its message.

“If you read the piece, it’s clear,” Poffenberger said. “If you don’t read it, then I don’t see why there’s any controversy or any question. If you read closely, it takes away the question.

“People in Santa Monica do take a look at campaign literature and aren’t just bamboozled by a quick impression.”

The Police Officers’ Assn., however, was not pleased.

Officer Shane Talbot, vice chairman of the association’s board, said the mailer was “unfortunate” and he had indicated to Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights “how unhappy I am.” He said the piece created an incorrect impression about who had received the organization’s endorsement.

Talbot said the association may publish an advertisement in a local newspaper this weekend, featuring Katz’s picture as a way to clarify who was endorsed.

Talbot said the association picked its candidates based on experience and with an eye toward maintaining some balance of political viewpoints on the City Council.

The flap underscored what many see as the heart of this race: whether Katz can retain his seat or whether all four tenant-faction candidates will sweep the vote, giving them an overwhelming 5-member majority on the council.

Many see Genser as Santa Monicans for Renters Rights’ weakest candidate, a perception that often pits him directly against Katz.

Campaign Letter

Meanwhile, supporters of Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights criticized a campaign letter backing Katz, signed by Planning Commissioner Donald Nelson and mailed by Katz’s campaign staff. Nelson is a member of the tenant faction, and his support for Katz was bound to create problems for Nelson.

However, at least two versions of the letter were circulated, including one that contained a second paragraph that Nelson said he never authorized.

The disputed passage says Nelson, despite being a member of Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights, refuses to endorse a SMRR candidate. The version Nelson said he authorized merely spoke of his support for Katz and did not mention whether he was endorsing other candidates.

Nelson says he in fact is supporting three of the tenant-faction candidates in addition to Katz. And although he has received a few irate calls about the letter, Nelson was being circumspect about the whole thing and chalking it up to an honest mistake.

“In every campaign, there’s a flap over the material,” Nelson said. “As long as there are campaigns and exchanges of philosophies, this is going to happen.”

Katz’s campaign manager, Jack McGrath, said about 16,000 copies of the letter were mailed and that apparently the unauthorized paragraph was an unintentional mistake that “fell through the cracks.” Katz said he was unhappy it happened and sought explanations from his campaign consultants.

Zane said he was not surprised “that Herb Katz’s campaign committee would take a slap at SMRR.”

Less Bickering

Despite these glitches, the level of bickering--as of Wednesday--in no way compared to past election years, when tempers, rhetoric and accusations flared.

In 1986, for example, Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights was incensed that the rival faction, the All Santa Monica Coalition, sought to portray its candidates as strong supporters of rent control--a tactic that contributed largely to a victory for two of the coalition’s three candidates. The coalition was accused of stealing its rivals’ slogan and name.

City Councilwoman Christine Reed, a veteran of many local campaigns and one of the coalition’s victors in that hard-fought 1986 race, said that a slugfest via mailers is to be expected.

“It’s part of the game,” Reed, a staunch opponent of the tenant faction, said. “Dukakis tried for a month and a half to take the high road and what did it get him? If they hit you in the gutter, then you have to hit back in the gutter.”

Reed is mounting her own attack on Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights over absentee ballot applications that the organization mailed last month.

SMRR dispatched between 10,000 and 20,000 applications to city voters. On the back of the cards, the organization printed its headquarters as a return address instead of the county registrar’s office, in apparent violation of the state Election Code.

The district attorney’s office is reviewing the case but had not decided as of Wednesday whether an investigation is warranted. A decision is not likely to be made before the election, Deputy District Atty. Herb Lapin said.

The applications that are received are being taken to the registrar’s office and processed.

Poffenberger said the format used had been cleared by the registrar’s office and the organization’s only intention had been to make it easier for people to vote. Reed’s accusations, he said, are purely political.

Reed planned this weekend to mail out a red-white-and-blue flyer reminding voters of the flap.

Setback for Slate

In a separate development, Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights suffered a setback when the full slate was not endorsed in a mailer being put out by the Berman and D’Agostino Campaigns consulting firm, which serves as the field office for the powerful political organization headed by Reps. Howard L. Berman (D-Panorama City) and Henry A. Waxman (D-Los Angeles).

Berman-D’Agostino publishes a slate card every election year, endorsing candidates in state and local elections, as well as ballot measures. Most candidates pay to be on the slate card, although the consultants themselves have a say in who is eligible.

The firm had already chosen incumbents Katz and Zane, both Democrats, to be on the mailer, leaving room for only two more candidates.

Poffenberger said Berman-D’Agostino chose to include Abdo and Rosenstein, leaving Genser off. The four Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights candidates then had a choice of staying off the mailer in support of Genser or proceeding with just the three of them; since Zane, as an incumbent, would have been included on the card regardless, they made what one called the “painful” decision to go ahead with the three and leave Genser out.

Genser said he was disappointed but accepted the decision as being best for the slate as a whole.

Zane said that if he and his partners had not accepted the choice and filled the slots with their own candidates, Berman-D’Agostino probably would have included another rival candidate, perhaps William Zev Speigel, who has been active in the Democratic Party at a county level for some time.

“It was a cut-your-losses kind of choice (which) we regretted,” Zane said.

No ‘Lasting Friction’

Apparently the decision provoked a difficult and wrenching discussion within the core of Santa Monicans for Renters Rights, though members denied there was any “lasting friction.”

Many politicians see inclusion on the Berman-D’Agostino card as the seal of Democratic Party approval. But Poffenberger, while acknowledging that the mailer is worth trying to get on, said other literature sent out by SMRR and the local Democratic Party Club is likely to reach more voters within Santa Monica.

Candidates, their campaigners and others said it remains unclear how much influence any of the mailers hold for voters. And this year, there are several different combinations of candidates being promoted on various mailers.

“There are enough combinations out there that in a tight race, varieties of things can happen,” said outgoing Mayor James Conn, a member of Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights who is not seeking reelection.