Race for Carson Treasurer Stirs Up Political Waters

The election of a treasurer in Carson, which once offered a respite from the city’s political wars, this year is a pitched battle.

Two-term incumbent Mary Custer has attracted the enmity of Mayor Michael Mitoma and Councilman John Anderson, who have backed her opponent Jaime (Jim) Punsalan. Custer has the endorsement of Councilwomen Kay Calas and Vera Robles DeWitt, who make up a two-member minority faction on the council.

Punsalan, 52, a deputy Los Angeles County assessor who is seeking office for the first time, said last week that Custer has bungled the investment of the city’s cash and that it is time for the city to have a professional in the treasurer’s job.

Custer, 59, has questioned Punsalan’s standing as a certified public accountant and his long-term commitment to the city.

Custer said last week that she should be elected to another four-year-term on Tuesday because she has invested the city’s $70-million portfolio wisely. She said Mitoma is trying to put into the treasurer’s office “a rubber stamp . . . so he can funnel the city’s investment to his favorite banks.”

Mitoma denied that he wants a treasurer who will do his bidding.

“If Mary (Custer) said that, she doesn’t deserve to be in office because she is lying,” he said. Anderson, who lashed out at Custer during a council meeting March 20, has said he is endorsing Punsalan as the more qualified candidate.

Punsalan said in an interview that he agreed to assist Anderson’s reelection campaign in return for an endorsement by Mitoma and Anderson, but Mitoma denied that he or Anderson sought anything in exchange.

He said he did ask Punsalan to provide the list of applicants for absentee ballots that Punsalan’s campaign had gathered, but Punsalan “was not able to provide that list. He needs us. We don’t need him.”

One of Punsalan’s chief arguments against Custer is that he is a CPA and she is not. “We need a professional, not a politician,” he said in an interview.

In a full-page ad in a recent issue of the Carson News, Punsalan said Custer had invested city funds in a bank at 9% interest on Dec. 19, when another bank was willing to pay a higher rate. The ad did not identify the bank or the rate it was offering.

Custer said the claim is false. She said she made a number of investments that day at rates ranging from 8.0% to 8.5% and that no bank was offering rates of 9% or higher on that date. She added that her investment policy is designed for safety, liquidity and yield, with priorities in that order. In the last fiscal year, she said the city earned $6 million on its $70-million investment portfolio.

“It is an excellent rate.” she said. “Other cities have lost money--we are talking of millions of dollars--making unwise investments. Carson has not lost one dollar since I have been treasurer.”

In criticizing Punsalan’s status as a professional accountant, she pointed out that he had let his status as a certified public accountant lapse in 1988.

Punsalan conceded that he had not paid his state fee in 1988 and that his license had been revoked for delinquency from Feb. 1, 1988, until May, 1989, when he belatedly paid. “I did not receive the billing until 1989,” he said.

This year, state officials mailed back his check and renewal form because it arrived incomplete, and the state Board of Accountancy listed him as delinquent as of Feb. 1, according to a state official. He mailed back the form properly filled out, and on March 12 state officials returned his license to active status, the official said.

Custer, a 26-year resident of Carson, has questioned Punsalan’s long-term commitment to the city.

In 1988, Punsalan said, he moved from a house he owns in Rancho Palos Verdes to a room in his in-laws’ house in Carson, in order to get involved in Carson politics. His wife stays with him from time to time in Carson, he said.

Punsalan said he lived in Carson for several years beginning in 1976, moved to Long Beach for several years, then moved back to Carson in the early 1980s. He bought the Rancho Palos Verdes house in the mid-1980s, he said.

Punsalan said he is campaigning with $20,000 of his own money and has not raised funds from any other sources. Custer has raised about $8,000.

The position of treasurer, which pays $53,640 a year, has a lower salary than any of the city’s appointed department heads, who make at least $13,000 a year more.