Neugebauer Counting on Big Finish : Supervisor’s race: Incumbent Wieder enjoys a wide financial lead, but challenger claims the edge in grass-roots support.

Although her once-hefty campaign coffers now hold only $35,000, Supervisor Harriett M. Wieder maintains a sizable financial lead over her November reelection opponent, Westminster Councilwoman Joy L. Neugebauer.

But Neugebauer, with only $3,014 on hand, according to the latest campaign disclosure reports, says she is not concerned.

“I’ll have enough grass-roots support that I’m not going to worry about the amount of dollars that Harriett has,” Neugebauer said last week. As for her own comparatively small campaign fund, she added: “I’ll watch it carefully and hope that it grows.”

Wieder, according to her campaign forms, spent most of the $319,000 that she raised since January, 1989, on besting Neugebauer and a field of three other candidates in the June 5 primary. She won 47.4% of the vote, compared to Neugebauer’s second-best 19.9%, and was forced into a runoff.

Allan Hoffenblum, Wieder’s campaign chairman, said last week that the incumbent will rely heavily on direct mail and the telephone solicitations of campaign workers to raise additional funds for the rest of the campaign. Wieder will probably spend money on some advertising, he said, although no decision has been made yet on whether to use radio or television commercials.

“I can’t go into specifics,” Hoffenblum said. “She’s going to run a hard-fought campaign is all I can tell you.”

During the last campaign reporting period, which ran from May 20 to June 30 and covered the crucial final days of the June campaign, Wieder’s single largest expenditure was $70,258 to a Woodland Hills graphics company for preparation and handling of direct mailings to Orange County constituents. Her second-largest expenditure was $24,915 paid to the U.S. Postal Service.

Wieder paid another $4,240 to Telly Design, a graphic arts firm in Pasadena, for work on direct-mail brochures and $2,800 to a polling firm. Hoffenblum’s campaign consulting firm received $10,000 for work leading up to the June election; campaign treasurer Betty Presley received $7,065; and Sue Hutchinson, coordinator of volunteers, received $5,766.

In contrast, Neugebauer’s largest campaign expense in the latest reporting period was $5,247 spent on a brochure inserted with the Pennysaver shopper. She also received $715 worth of free printing from the Impression Connection in Westminster. Neugebauer said her campaign chairman, Ed Merrill, is an unpaid volunteer.