Cap on Donations for O.C. Candidates Urged : Reform: Activist Shirley Grindle asks board to schedule June election on issue. Sheriff opposes plan.

Orange County supervisors were asked Tuesday to consider sweeping reforms that would effectively replace a 13-year-old campaign finance ordinance and for the first time cap all contributions to candidates for county offices.

The proposal was outlined by community activist Shirley L. Grindle, who led the drive to overhaul Orange County supervisorial fund raising in 1978 and who chairs the committee that has spearheaded the current reform effort. Grindle asked the board to schedule a June election to let voters decide on the proposal.

The supervisors are not expected to vote on the idea until December or early January, but four of the five members voiced their tentative support following Grindle’s presentation.

“My reaction is a favorable one,” said Board of Supervisors Chairman Gaddi H. Vasquez. “At first glance, I’m favorably inclined to support it.”

Like his colleagues, Vasquez added that he will wait on passing final judgment until after the county counsel’s office has reviewed the proposal. But if no unexpected problems arise, Vasquez said he would be prepared to make a formal proposal to set a June election.

Supervisors Harriett M. Wieder, Roger R. Stanton and Thomas F. Riley each added their tentative support in separate interviews, while Supervisor Don R. Roth said he still had not had a chance to review the proposal. If a majority of the board backs it, that would clear the way for the June referendum.

The seven-page proposal presented Tuesday represents a sweeping and comprehensive package of campaign reforms, but the most striking section is the contribution limit. Under it, candidates could raise only $1,000 from each contributor during a four-year election cycle. Candidates who faced a runoff would be allowed to raise an additional $1,000 per contributor.

The actual drafting of the new proposal was done by Robert M. Stern, co-director of the nonprofit California Commission on Campaign Financing and the principal author of California’s Political Reform Act. Stern attended Tuesday’s board meeting, vouching for the proposal’s constitutionality and offering to field any legal questions.

Grindle, a former county planning commissioner who was the primary backer of a 1978 county campaign ordinance known as TINCUP, has clashed with members of the Board of Supervisors in the past. But Tuesday, her message was conciliatory, and she came bearing an actual olive branch--a symbol, she said, of her “mission of peace.”

“We are not at war with the Board of Supervisors,” Grindle said. “We hope that you join with us in correcting a wrong that has been going on in the county.”

The chief problem with the current system, according to Grindle and others, is that political action committees are not regulated by county law.

Under TINCUP, supervisors can accept any amount from a contributor but must abstain from matters involving any donor who gives more than $1,944 during any four-year period. However, the ordinance does not address contributions from PACs.

A Times Orange County Edition investigation published in May found that PACs have donated more than $820,000 to county supervisorial candidates during the past 14 years. Those contributions are on the rise, growing by 684% since 1977, the year before TINCUP took effect. But, because TINCUP does not mention PACs, no supervisor has ever been forced to abstain from a vote because of PAC contribution.

Neither Grindle nor the members of the TINCUP Steering Committee criticized the supervisors, however, instead blaming the growth of PAC contributions on those who donate the money and on campaign consultants who help solicit it.

“You’re not the bad guys,” Grindle said, emphasizing that she and her committee hope to work with the board and win its endorsement of their proposal. Grindle offered to meet individually with each of the supervisors in the coming weeks to explain the proposal and its ramifications.

The situation was different in the 1970s, when Grindle and the TINCUP group challenged an angry and defensive Board of Supervisors with their original campaign reform ordinance. That became law after it had qualified for the ballot and the board enacted it rather than let it go to voters for almost certain approval.

The Board of Supervisors in those days had been buffeted by a number of scandals relating to campaigns and political contributions. Three were eventually indicted, and one, Supervisor Ralph A. Diedrich, went to prison.

Supervisor Riley is the only holdover from those years who still sits on the board, but Grindle went out of her way Tuesday to praise Riley’s integrity.

“You’re so clean you squeak,” she told him during her presentation. Riley, beaming, thanked her with a nod.

Sheriff Brad Gates, who was in the audience during Grindle’s presentation, was less receptive. Gates has denounced Grindle’s proposal as an unconstitutional attempt to curb citizens’ rights to give to the candidate of their choice.

Under Grindle’s proposal, the county’s campaign law would for the first time regulate donations to candidates for all county offices, not just county supervisor. As a result, the sheriff and other officeholders such as the district attorney and county clerk would have to deal with contribution limits.

Grindle pointed that out in her presentation and asked the board members to send copies of the proposal to each of the affected elected officials. But she broke from her talk to say that it would be a “personal pleasure” to hand-deliver a copy to Gates, whose political fund raising she has criticized.

A startled Gates received a copy from her without standing up while some members of the board chuckled quietly.

“I took that as an affront,” Gates said later. “She made a spectacle of me.”

Supporters of the proposal, however, say it would not only close the PAC loophole but also streamline the sometimes cumbersome TINCUP ordinance. TINCUP requires supervisors to abstain from projects involving their major campaign contributors, those people or companies who contribute more than $1,944 during a four-year period.

That limit changes every year, and keeping track of who has contributed more than the threshold amount is a task that has fallen to Grindle as TINCUP’s self-appointed guardian. Supervisors often complain about the paperwork associated with TINCUP.

“This new proposal sounds simpler,” Supervisor Stanton said. “I’ve always been with the spirit of this thing (TINCUP), and if this is compatible with that spirit--and I’m sure it must be or she (Grindle) wouldn’t be here--then it sounds good to me.”

Campaign Reform At a Glance

If approved by county voters, the campaign-reform proposal unveiled Tuesday before the Orange County Board of Supervisors would:

Cap all contributions and loans to candidates for county office at $1,000 per contributor, per election. Candidates who face a runoff could raise an additional $1,000 per contributor.

Extend county campaign laws to candidates for sheriff, district attorney, assessor, treasurer-tax collector, county clerk, recorder, auditor, public administrator and superintendent of schools.

Allow county officeholders who want to run for different posts to set up separate fund-raising committees for those efforts.

Prohibit candidates from receiving contributions from the political war chests of other officeholders, a technique known as “transferring.”

Prohibit candidates from accepting a contribution unless the donor’s name, address, occupation and employer are fully disclosed and recorded.

Punish violators of the ordinance by up to six months in jail and a $1,000 fine. Orange County citizens or the district attorney also could bring civil lawsuits against violators.

Source: Proposed campaign-reform ordinance drafted by the TINCUP Steering Committee.