CALIFORNIA ELECTIONS / INSURANCE COMMISSIONER : Collis Launches Attack Ad Against 2 Challengers

Conway Collis, a candidate for the Democratic nomination for insurance commissioner, Saturday began airing a new attack commercial alleging that two leading opponents, state Sen. John Garamendi (D-Walnut Grove) and television commentator Bill Press, are the candidates of the insurance industry and the state’s trial lawyers, respectively.

Both Garamendi’s and Press’ campaigns cried foul. Another Democratic candidate, Walter Zelman, described the new ad as “fiction,” referring to its statement that Collis had been involved “every step of the way” in the fight for Proposition 103, the insurance reform initiative that passed in 1988.

Garamendi said: “Let me restate the facts. I’ve not taken a single dime from any insurance company in this campaign. I will make every insurance company obey Proposition 103. I will create the most effective insurance consumer protection agency in the nation.”

Press’ campaign manager, Michael Ganley, called the new Collis ad “a deliberate distortion by a desperate, failed politician.”

Ganley took a swipe at Collis’ record on the state Board of Equalization, saying: “Once again, Collis is running away from his sorry past of accepting campaign contributions from big corporations and then voting them big tax breaks. In fact, Collis, the professional politician, accepted over $20,000 (in his board campaigns) from the very insurance companies whose backs he now promises to break.”

Zelman said records he has gathered indicate the insurers gave Collis only $6,850 in his past campaigns. But in taking exception to Collis’ new ad, Zelman suggested that it contains so many misstatements that television stations should refuse to run it.

The new Collis commercial features Harvey Rosenfield, the author of Proposition 103 who has endorsed Collis for insurance commissioner. It also shows pictures of both Press and Garamendi, calling Press the trial lawyers “guy” and Garamendi the insurance industry’s “guy.”

It also alleges that $90 million was spent by the insurers and the trial lawyers to defeat Proposition 103. Contribution and spending reports filed with the state in 1988, however, showed the lawyers spent nothing to defeat Proposition 103, and that of $64 million spent in the insurance initiative campaigns that year by insurers, a considerable amount went to advance their own three initiatives, not to attack Proposition 103.