Bernhardt Fund Raising Going Slowly; Opponents Rely on Own Money

San Diego City Councilwoman Linda Bernhardt is entering her recall campaign saddled with a heavy debt from her 1989 race, and most of her major opponents are relying principally on their own money in their bids to succeed her, campaign finance reports filed Thursday show.

During the first seven weeks of this year, two Bernhardt campaign committees have raised only $395, leaving her with a $102,200 debt from 1989 even as she battles for the right to serve the rest of the four-year term to which she was elected.

Slightly more than half of that debt--$54,700--represents a personal loan that Bernhardt made to her last campaign.

However, Bernhardt’s fund-raising activities had been largely on hold pending a San Diego Superior Court judge’s Feb. 6 ruling on the legality and location of the April 9 election. In addition, a third group backing Bernhardt had not filed its report with the city clerk’s office by late Thursday.

In his decision, Judge Harrison Hollywood ordered the 5th District race to proceed and, overturning a City Council vote, ruled that it must be held in the district that elected her, rather than the new one created under a controversial redistricting plan last year.

Since then, Bernhardt has been aggressively soliciting contributions in her bid for political survival in the first council recall election since the City Charter was approved early this century.

If Bernhardt’s fund-raising prowess to date has been unimpressive, so, too, has been that of the group spearheading the effort to oust her. The Recall Bernhardt Committee, which qualified the issue for the ballot by gathering 11,289 voters’ signatures on recall petitions, raised only $869 during the same Jan. 1-Feb. 23 period, according to its report.

At least three of the seven candidates seeking to replace Bernhardt, meanwhile, are largely underwriting their campaigns with their own money, while another has received sizable contributions from development interests, the reports show.

Repeating a pattern seen in his past council and mayoral campaigns, former San Diego City Councilman Floyd Morrow had loaned his campaign $21,200 and raised only $775 in outside contributions as of Feb. 23.

Similarly, the contribution total of county planning analyst Mike Eckmann consisted entirely of a personal $8,000 loan. Kenneth Moser, a credit union manager, loaned his campaign $3,000 of the $3,675 that he had raised as of last week, the reports show.

John Brand, a land-use planner, raised $2,450 for his campaign, general contractor Leslie Braund raised $2,530, and candidate Dena Holman, an aide to former Rep. Jim Bates (D-San Diego) had not filed her report by late Thursday.

The candidate who has raised the most money in the 5th District contest is corporate attorney Tom Behr, who has received donations totaling $12,127. About half of that has come from developers and those in related fields, including architecture, construction supply companies, title insurance firms and lawyers.

Under the unusual double-election format that will be used in April, Bernhardt will run alone in an up-or-down contest in which a simple majority vote will determine her political fate, while the six other candidates compete in a tandem election.

If Bernhardt receives more than 50% of the vote, she would retain her post, rendering the outcome of the companion election on possible successors moot. However, if Bernhardt were ousted, the candidate drawing the most votes in the other race--in which Bernhardt cannot compete--would serve the rest of her four-year term, which expires in December, 1993.

Recall leaders have cited a number of factors as the impetus behind their effort, including their dissatisfaction with Bernhardt’s approval of the redistricting plan that shifted several high-growth neighborhoods from the 5th District. Her opponents also have complained that, since her election, Bernhardt has accepted campaign contributions from developers after pledging not to do so in her 1989 campaign.

Calling the recall effort “politics at its very worst,” Bernhardt argues that the campaign is being largely orchestrated by individuals who opposed her during the 1989 election in which she upset two-term incumbent Ed Struiksma.