Politics Makes Waves at Water District

The gentlemanly world of California’s powerful water industry has suddenly been pulled into the mud of a wide-open political campaign, replete with unprecedented lobbying and allegations of back-room deals and vote swapping.

At stake is control of the Metropolitan Water District, the world’s largest water agency and the primary source of water for more than 15 million Southern Californians in a district extending from Ventura County to the Mexican border and inland to Riverside.

The vote on a new chairman for the giant agency, directors and staff say, could result in more water for San Diego agricultural interests, lessen Los Angeles’ claim to billions of gallons annually and set the stage for an activist environmental agenda.

The election also represents a face-off between the older, traditionalist wing of the board with close ties to the agency staff and the upstart faction of younger, more political directors who want to set a new direction for the agency.

“It’s not like the old days,” said Robert Gottlieb, UCLA professor of urban planning and former MWD director.

Facing off in a vote scheduled for Tuesday are Fullerton director James Blake, 62, the official candidate of the board’s nominating committee, and Los Angeles director Mike Gage, 47, who will be nominated from the floor. Other directors, including Chairwoman Lois Kreiger, a director from the Western Municipal Water District of Riverside County, may also have their names placed in nomination.

The unusually active campaign for the unpaid, two-year post has polarized the 51-member board of directors and created alliances among historic enemies.

These days, directors spend as much time whispering in the hallways and buttonholing uncommitted colleagues as they used to spend jabbering about the esoterica of dams, snowpack and pumps. Hopefuls are throwing parties and supporters are working a breakfast and lunch circuit to twist arms orjust plead for votes.

“I’ve never been courted like this before,” said Tim Brick, who represents Pasadena on the board.

But many directors are concerned about the changes.

“There’s an evil wind blowing,” said MWD director John Killefer, a director from the Coastal Municipal Water District in Orange County. “We’ve never seen anything like it before.”

Indeed, past elections for chairman were usually formalities accomplished by a vote of acclamation.

Directors representing the 27 member agencies of the MWD have voting power based on the tax base in their city or district. Los Angeles, with the greatest tax base in the region, has the largest contingent on the board, with eight directors who cast 22.1% of the vote. Fullerton, for example, has one director and less than 1% of the vote.

Gage, president of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power Commission and a former chief of staff to Mayor Tom Bradley, threw the race for chairman wide open in August by declining to support his delegation colleague, attorney Marilyn Garcia, who months earlier had begun her own campaign.

Some directors said Garcia could have won the official nomination--with Gage’s endorsement and the support of the Los Angeles delegation.

At the center of controversy is the San Diego County contingent, which controls 15% of the vote. San Diego directors--who tend to vote as a solid block--want the MWD to provide a guaranteed source of water for its agricultural customers, and they want more funding for projects to provide that water.

By law, virtually all of the MWD’s water supply is to be used for municipal, industrial and household purposes. But in practice, agriculture has gotten most of the water it needed from the MWD, even in drought years.

Los Angeles has for decades vehemently opposed sharing the MWD’s dwindling water resources with agricultural interests.

But in the months leading up to the chairman’s election, the Los Angeles delegation--at Gage’s behest--reversed its opposition.

Suddenly, the two contingents, which have historically been the most combative, were among the most cooperative. And that led to widespread accusations that a deal may have been struck between the two delegations to swap votes for agricultural assistance for a vote in the chairman’s race.

“That’s what I hear, and I don’t like it,” one longtime director said, echoing the concerns of many colleagues.

Gage said that “there is no deal.”

Since joining the board 14 months ago, Gage said, he has worked to settle the differences between Los Angeles and San Diego to the advantage of both--and for the MWD.

And, he said, Los Angeles gained from his switch in position on agricultural water because it requires farmers to give up longtime subsidies and discounts and begin paying the full cost of water. The measure was approved by the 51-member board with only one “no” vote.

San Diego directors also deny there is a vote swap. But they acknowledge that there has been a welcome change in Los Angeles’ willingness to cooperate since Gage arrived on the board, and they say they want to see that continue.

“The only deal we are making is a deal of cooperation,” said Francesca M. Kraul, one of six San Diego representatives on the MWD board. “There’s a new, general spirit of cooperation (that can make the MWD) a stronger district.”

Dale Mason, another San Diego director, said: “We’ve been able to work with Los Angeles recently. They started showing leadership. Before, they wouldn’t make a deal that would stick.”

The new leadership, which Mason attributes to Gage’s arrival, has persuaded him to support the Los Angeles director for chairman.

Gage calls the allegations of vote swapping “negative campaigning.”

“Those who are trying to find a reason to oppose me say that,” he said.

In August, the competition for chairman became a free-for-all when Gage declined to support his delegation colleague, attorney Garcia. Gage said he did not believe Garcia could win, so he launched his own bid and enlisted the support of Bradley to persuade members of the delegation to back him.

Garcia’s candidacy, and her early appeal among directors, was a historic step for the agency, which has long been accused of being an Anglo men’s club. But sensing that she lacked the support of her Los Angeles colleagues, Garcia’s backers began drifting to other candidates, including Fullerton’s Blake.

Although any director could be nominated on election day, the contest is expected to come down to a battle between Gage and Blake.

Blake, a financial consultant and retired FBI special agent, announced his intentions to seek the chairman’s post in February. He has served five years on the MWD board and works with other water organizations around the state, including the Assn. of California Water Agencies.

Blake said he can bring together the increasingly divided factions of the board and formulate a cohesive plan. He favors increased water purchases and transfers from other parts of the state and supports construction of reservoirs.

“I bring a balance of thought, a balance of ideas,” Blake said.

Gage, a television news commentator who describes himself as a “pragmatic environmentalist,” said his agenda is to rebuild public trust and support in the agency while firming up internal communications finances. From a more unified position and with a clear consensus, Gage said the agency would be better able to gain access to new water sources, including purchases and transfers, through the political process.

The candidates agree unconditionally on at least one point: The election will be a horse race.

It will also be a heated one. Gage’s position on agricultural water has come under fire from officials outside the MWD.

Assemblyman Richard Polanco (D-Los Angeles), a frequent critic of the MWD, said: “It sounds like typical insider wheeler-dealing. I hope he doesn’t cut a deal that would hurt L.A.” Polanco has written Bradley asking him to look into the vote taken in April on providing agricultural water.

Polanco and others complain that with dwindling resources and a continuing drought it is senseless to take on new customers.

At the same time, some MWD directors said they are concerned about the concentration of power that an alliance between Los Angeles and San Diego would create. Blake said the bulk of his support is in small and mid-size agencies.

Brick of Pasadena acknowledged that “the smaller agencies are concerned.” But he said he is nonetheless leaning toward Gage, who “is better prepared to deal with the water politics of the ‘90s.”

With just over a week to go, many board members just want the vote to be over.

Blake said this year’s process is “divisive, and that is not good for the district. . . . It leads to hard feelings that are not healthy.”

Gage said the active campaign is “a sign that things are out of sync; the leadership and membership are diverging.”

But change is often uncomfortable and unwelcome.

As one longtime director said: “We never really had an election for chairman in the past. It was never challenged. That’s the way it should be.”