San Diego Expects Respect as Favorite Son Heads the State

Catch the wave of expectation cresting through San Diego’s civic elite these days: One of their own has been elected the 36th governor of California and now they want some respect.

With former Mayor Pete Wilson to be inaugurated today, city leaders say San Diego has never been in a better position to shed its reputation as California’s cultural “cul-de-sac” and assume its rightful place as the state’s second-largest city.

They are tired of living down the image of a sleepy Navy town and one-dimensional vacation spot, where sailors, surfers and retirees exist quietly in the shadow of brawny Los Angeles. They are tired of getting left out by the power brokers in Sacramento when it comes time to divvy up state money for social programs and hand out political plums.

So they are banking on favorite son Wilson and his coterie of hometown advisers.

“He (Wilson) really did a lot to put San Diego on the public map,” said Robert C. Fellmeth, a law professor and director of University of San Diego’s Center for Public Interest Law. “I think that, at least before this election or Pete Wilson’s rise, people in California and Sacramento thought the state stopped somewhere south of Disneyland.”

Now, said Wilson spokesman Otto Bos, “The chances of San Diego getting its fair share has probably improved by the fact that you have a San Diegan sitting here at probably the most powerful job in the state. It’s got to help.”

Fueling the enthusiasm is the hope that Wilson, like Gov. George Deukmejian before him, will reward his trusted supporters with appointments to influential state boards and commissions--jobs that set the tone for state regulation and planning. Some of the more prestigious posts include membership on the UC Board of Regents, Cal State Board of Trustees, Public Utilities Commission, California Transportation Commission and California Coastal Commission.

Deukmejian, in his appointments to these and many other boards, drew heavily upon supporters from hometown Long Beach and from fellow Armenians.

He appointed his former law partner to the state Supreme Court; his brother-in-law to the Del Mar Fair board; his barber to the Board of Barber Examiners; his local sporting goods retailer to the Fish and Game Commission; his minister to the Board of Behavioral Science Examiners, and his neighbor across the street to the California Medical Assistance Commission.

Although Wilson has made no appointments of hometowners to his top posts, San Diegans expect the same treatment in the hundreds of jobs to be filled later.

Wilson has decided to open a San Diego gubernatorial office. His aides are said to be working behind the scenes to persuade the Republicans to hold their 1992 national convention in San Diego.

Civic leaders say they are counting on Wilson even more to ensure that their county of 2.5 million people gets its fair share of state programs. Among the ills needing attention are a threadbare county treasury, massively overcrowded jails, a steady stream of illegal immigrants, an overburdened mental health system and rogue sewage lapping onto beaches from Tijuana sewer pipes.

Frustrations over failure to get Sacramento’s attention have prompted county leaders to sue the state for additional money three times in the last five years. One of the suits was successful; the other two are pending.

Part of the reason for San Diego’s weak showing in Sacramento is that its representation has lagged behind its growth. Of the 120-member Legislature, Los Angeles County holds 52 seats and the San Francisco Bay Area has 21. San Diego has 11. New census figures that are expected to confirm San Diego’s growth and the redistricting that will follow should narrow the gap. But the city’s political clout still will not match Los Angeles.

Former state Sen. James R. Mills of San Diego said the city itself is partly to blame for its seeming isolation, electing legislators often considered provincial and sometimes offbeat.

“San Diego was thought to send some strange people to Sacramento,” said Mills, a Democrat who, as Senate President Pro Tem during the 1970s, counted himself an exception.

“It was easy to take advantage of San Diego because San Diego was such a political island,” said Mills, now chairman of the city’s Metropolitan Transit Development Board. “It’s out of the mainstream, therefore the people writing legislation could treat it lightly.”

In Sacramento, San Diegans complain that they are still treated lightly, but for different reasons.

“They cannot understand that we have gang problems, drug problems and jail overcrowding problems,” said Kathryn C. Rees, Sacramento lobbyist for the city of San Diego. “They can only think of San Diego as the sunny, sleepy town along the border, in the shadow of L.A.”

With Wilson as governor, there is a chance to change all that, said Lee Grissom, president of the Greater San Diego Chamber of Commerce. “If there is something that San Diego needs . . . this is literally a once-in-a-lifetime chance to achieve it,” he said.