ELECTIONS : 37TH ASSEMBLY DISTRICT : Wright, Braly Make Last House Calls : Challenger: The man who hopes to win Cathie Wright’s Assembly seat is met mostly by dogs and undecided voters during a difficult Saturday of walking precincts.

The candidate had reached another impasse.

The only response Hunt Braly got when he rang the doorbell was a dog barking hysterically on the other side of the front door. It had been happening all morning Saturday in an otherwise quiet Simi Valley neighborhood of beige stucco homes, cul-de-sacs and family minivans.

“Too bad dogs don’t vote,” Braly said. “The dogs always seem to be home.”

It was that kind of day for the candidate, who is trying to unseat Assemblywoman Cathie Wright (R-Simi Valley) in Tuesday’s GOP primary. But Braly, the top aide to state Sen. Ed Davis (R-Santa Clarita), is used to it. For the past two months, he has been walking precincts in the sprawling district, which stretches through three counties, from Lompoc to Santa Clarita.

Braly, 35, and Wright, 61, a feisty legislator with a hard-bitten style, are finishing up the most bitterly contested and most expensive primary race waged this spring in the area.

Braly spent most of Saturday ringing doorbells of Republican households in Simi Valley and Agoura Hills, before retiring to his phone bank to contact still more voters.

Whether voters appreciated Braly’s efforts in the hot sun was not apparent. Most people graciously took his white and green pamphlet and promised to read it. A number refused to commit themselves to the candidate.

The poker faces seemed to puzzle Dennis Mullins, a Los Angeles attorney, who was among a handful of volunteers helping out.

“People don’t say anything to me,” Mullins told Braly as they momentarily crossed paths. “No one said I’m with you or against you.”

Only one voter, a Los Angeles City fire captain, accepted Braly’s offer to answer any questions.

Standing in the driveway, the two become engrossed in a dizzying conversation about special assessment districts, land use issues and the effects of Proposition 13 on the infrastructure needs of urban areas.

“Cathie Wright is a 100% development vote in Sacramento,” said Braly, who called himself a proponent of managed growth.

But John Hollaway, a Simi Valley resident, seemed sold for another reason.

“Any friend of Ed Davis is a friend of mine. I was a police officer before I was a firefighter.”

Walking away from yet another unanswered door, Braly bragged that he had only encountered two rude people during his entire campaign. Well, make that three. It happened again Saturday when an elderly woman appeared in the doorway scowling. Discovering that the visitor was a politician did not brighten her mood. When the candidate tried to hand her a brochure, the door swung shut.

Despite the heat, Braly crisscrossed the streets as if he were in a relay race. Eventually, he decided the occasional blast of air conditioning from a voter’s doorway wasn’t enough.

Retreating to a nearby Denny’s, Braly watched as everybody at the table ordered root beer floats and pie. The candidate, who lost 50 pounds last year on microwave diet food, didn’t flinch. The waitress brought him a diet Coke and half a cantaloupe.

“I’m glad somebody is being healthy,” he said.

After the 30-minute break, Braly was back on the campaign trail trying to make up for his late start. At 10 a.m. when his crew was ready to start walking, he discovered that no one had brought the precinct lists that pinpointed faithful GOP voters.

“What a time to screw up,” groaned Braly as he dashed into a Simi Valley insurance office to call his campaign manager.

His volunteer coordinator, Matt Laster, a tall affable man with a strawberry blond beard and Birkenstocks sandals, ran after Braly before pausing to ask a question.

“You’re with the L.A. Times? Oh, God,” he said. Then catching himself, he tried to put a good spin on the goof. “In spite of all this, we’ll win.”

The precinct lists, kept in a cardboard box, were located at the campaign headquarters in Santa Clarita. Within minutes, Dave Demshki, the campaign manager, was speeding toward Simi Valley.

But before getting on the freeway, Demshki spotted a Braly volunteer heading to the same place. He honked his horn, hoping the man could carry the boxed records to Simi Valley, but he didn’t catch his attention.

When the two arrived at the rendezvous point, Demshki good-naturedly chided the other driver for not noticing him. The volunteer had noticed him, but thought he was an angry motorist trying to cause trouble.

“You almost got flipped off,” he said. “But then I remembered I had Hunt Braly bumper stickers on my car.”