ELECTIONS 60TH ASSEMBLY DISTRICT : Longtime Foes Horcher, Papen Battle Again

Freshman Assemblyman Paul Horcher (R-Diamond Bar) speaks eight languages, but he doesn’t communicate very well with Diamond Bar Councilwoman Phyllis Papen.

The reason, says Papen, who’s running against Horcher in the June 2 Republican primary, is that his main linguistic gift is double talk.

She said Horcher is constantly backtracking and changing positions because he is “unprincipled and without a philosophy of government. . . . My experience is that he votes based on the barometer or applause meter. He counts the number of spotted owls and loggers in the audience.”

Horcher, meanwhile, hasn’t remained silent. In a cable television commercial, he has accused Papen of voting on the Diamond Bar City Council to benefit a client of her “live-in boyfriend.” Papen said she has done nothing wrong, and she has run her own commercials comparing Horcher to a trained seal.

Not a very elevated campaign so far in the San Gabriel Valley’s 60th Assembly District, but no surprise to those who have watched the parallel and contentious paths of Horcher, a 40-year-old attorney, and Papen, a 47-year-old real estate agent, in Diamond Bar politics.

Those paths crossed a decade ago.

Horcher, who was born in Texas, moved with his family to California as a child and graduated from Rowland High School in 1969. He obtained a law degree and worked overseas for two years in South Africa, Iran and Saudi Arabia, developing a proficiency in eight languages, including Arabic and Persian, before returning home to start a law practice.

Papen grew up in Chicago in an evangelical Christian household and married a minister. “My career goal was to support my husband, who supported my family,” she said.

But her marriage ended 12 years ago. In building a new life, Papen became a real estate agent and became active in community improvement groups and politics.

Horcher, contends that Papen has been trying to get even ever since he defeated her for election to the Diamond Bar Municipal Advisory Council 10 years ago.

Nonsense, said Papen. “I don’t hold a grudge.” Papen and Horcher were elected to the first Diamond Bar City Council when voters approved incorporation in 1989. Papen became mayor and Horcher was named mayor pro tem. They said they tried to get along. But then Horcher accused Councilman Gary Miller, who was running for the state Senate, of a conflict of interest, a charge that Papen and others thought was politically motivated. Horcher supported then-Assemblyman Frank Hill (R--Whittier) in the Senate race, and Hill won.

With Papen leading the way, the council stripped Horcher of the title of mayor pro tem to punish him for his attacks on Miller.

But that didn’t stop voters from electing Horcher to succeed Hill in the state Assembly. Horcher spent more than $300,000 of his own money to win a narrow victory over seven Republican rivals in the primary two years ago and then defeat a Democrat in November over opposition from dissident Republicans, including Papen.

When Papen ran for reelection to the Diamond Bar City Council last year, Horcher ran newspaper ads against her.

Papen said she is not running against Horcher to pursue a vendetta, but would run against anyone who votes the way Horcher does in Sacramento.

Her main complaint is that Horcher tries to have things both ways. For example, she said, he provided the decisive 54th vote in the Assembly for Gov. Pete Wilson’s state budget last year, but claims he is not responsible for the tax increases needed to support the budget since he didn’t vote for the individual levies. Papen said Horcher is being typically evasive.

Horcher, who was one of nine Republicans who voted for the budget, said he supported it in hopes the governor would use his line-item veto to reduce expenditures. “I helped him on the cuts, not the taxes,” Horcher said.

But Horcher’s crucial vote for the budget was so important to Wilson that the governor has returned the favor by strongly supporting his reelection campaign. Or, as Papen sees it, “Basically, the governor bought Horcher’s vote.”

Papen was counting on conservative Republicans at odds with the governor to send money to her campaign, but conceded, “I’m not getting any support from Sacramento.” She said Assembly Republicans who encouraged her to run won’t give her money because she favors abortion rights, and they don’t.

But Republican sources said the stumbling block was not abortion, since Horcher is for abortion rights for women too, but the fact that Papen failed to persuade them that she could beat Horcher, given the power of his incumbency and his strong support from the governor.

Nevertheless, Papen is running a spirited, if underfinanced, campaign, seeking to portray Horcher as deeply indebted to special interests, such as the California Trial Lawyers Assn., which has given him nearly $20,000 in campaign donations.

Papen said Horcher has catered to the trial lawyers by putting impediments in the way of workers’ compensation reform and no-fault auto insurance, both of which she supports. Papen would limit the ability of employees to file stress claims under workers’ compensation and favors a no-fault system for auto insurance claims under $15,000.

Horcher said he has not tailored his position to attract donations from trial lawyers or any other group. “Ask them why they contribute to my campaign,” he said. “I presume it’s because they like my policies. It’s not because I like theirs.”

As vice chairman of the Assembly Insurance Committee, Horcher said improvements in auto and health insurance and in workers’ compensation are among his top priorities. And proof that he is an advocate of low taxes, he said, can be found in his endorsement from the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn.

But the debate over issues has paled beside the merciless personal attacks in the two candidates’ commercials running on cable television. Horcher’s ad shows an unflattering picture of Papen popping out of a garbage can while the narrator describes how she voted to give the Diamond Bar trash collection contract to a client of her “live-in boyfriend” in a “sweetheart deal” that could cost taxpayers $1 million a year.

Papen said the commercial is crude, offensive and wrong. She said she shares a condominium with Michael Lowe, a consultant to Western Waste and other trash companies. Papen sided with the majority last month in a 3-1 vote deciding to negotiate a contract with Western Waste.

Papen said she obtained an opinion from the state Fair Political Practices Commission that she could vote on the issue because she and Lowe keep their bills and bank accounts separate. She said Horcher’s reference to Lowe as a “live-in boyfriend” could imply that he’s “a gigolo, and I take great offense to that.”

In addition, she said, the ad’s claim that the Western Waste contract will be costly to taxpayers cannot be substantiated because the contract is still being negotiated. However, Western Waste’s proposal was higher than its competitors.

Meanwhile, Papen is airing a commercial that shows a dog rolling over while a narrator asks why Horcher rolled over to vote for a costly state budget. It then shows a trained seal while alleging that Horcher plays ball with Assembly Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco) and shows a school of fish in a feeding frenzy while the narrator says that Horcher “dove right in with the California trial lawyers.”

Papen’s commercial ends by urging voters to vote for her because, “She’s not one of the good old boys.” The tag line to Horcher’s commercial is “Phyllis Papen? Garbage.”

There are two other candidates in the 60th District. Stan Caress, a political science professor from West Covina, is unopposed for the Democratic nomination, and Robert Lewis, an industrial electronics engineer from Rowland Heights, is running on the American Independent ticket. Republicans outnumber Democrats 46% to 43.5%. The American Independent registration is slightly more than 1% of the total.

60TH ASSEMBLY CANDIDATES

The 60th Assembly District includes Diamond Bar, La Mirada, La Habra Heights, Rowland Heights, Walnut, West Covina and parts of the City of Industry, Pomona and Whittier.

Here are brief biographies of the two Republicans competing in the June 2 primary.

Paul V. Horcher

Born: Aug. 31, 1951

Residence: Diamond Bar

Education: BA in political science, Cal Poly Pomona; JD, University of La Verne College of Law

Career highlights: Established private law practice in 1981 after working overseas. Elected to the City Council when Diamond Bar incorporated in 1989. Elected to the state Assembly in 1990.

Personal: Wife, Van Le, is a computer systems analyst. Two daughters.

Phyllis Papen

Born: Nov. 14, 1944

Residence: Diamond Bar

Education: BA in education, Moody Bible Institute, Chicago

Career highlights: A licensed real estate agent since 1978. Organized Diamond Bar incorporation campaign; elected to Diamond Bar City Council in 1989 and again in 1991.

Personal: Single. Two children; one grandchild.