ELECTIONS / SANTA MONICA CITY COUNCIL : Ballot Names to Swamp Voters

When a field of candidates is large enough to fill two baseball teams, it’s hard to tell the players even with a score card.

Yet that is the task facing Santa Monica voters as they pick and choose among a jumble of 18 candidates seeking four City Council seats.

The size of the field is evidence that Santa Monica is, along with much of the country, in the throes of an election season of discontent, in which the hallmark is voter dissatisfaction with government and politicians.

Divisions within the city’s political factions are also manifest. Santa Monicans for Renters Rights, the liberal coalition that controls the council, is now divided over development issues and the recent firing of City Atty. Robert M. Myers, who wrote the rent control law.

The rift is such that it’s a pretty safe bet that not all of the four SMRR candidates are even voting for each other, though they ostensibly claim to be supporting the slate.

The rest of the residents are even more fractured and can’t agree on a slate of candidates.

“It’s a mess,” community activist Donna Alvarez said. “I cannot see any sense of organization anywhere.”

Meanwhile, a number of independents, most of them with little money and a lot to say, are offering their services to deal with what they say is incompetence at City Hall.

“I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore,” says candidate Patrick Regan, an assistant film director, who is running on a “throw the rascals out” platform.

Though many of them put it more politely, the need for fresh faces, new ideas and a different approach to governing the city is the one theme that runs through the candidates’ platforms.

“Santa Monica needs a new direction,” said Merritt Coleman, whose chief concern is development and its problems.

“SMRR has not adequately run our city,” said Joel Pierce, a RAND Corp. computer manager. “We need candidates not beholden to the SMRR group.”

Candidate Dorothy Ehrhart-Morrison, a child development specialist, said recently that she is running “to bring back respect and confidence in the City Council.”

A key focus of candidates Alan Weston, a financial adviser, and Tom Pyne, a St. John’s Hospital administrator, has been the issue of managing city spending in an economic downturn. “We are in a crisis in Santa Monica,” said Weston, noting that city spending is up 50% from four years ago.

Pyne decries Santa Monica’s “lavish municipal lifestyle” and asks, “What are we getting in return?”

Beyond the rhetoric, any discussion of the outcome of the race has to start with SMRR, which had raised $109,502 by Sept. 30, the close of the last campaign reporting period, with $66,624 in the bank at that time.

Especially this year, when all candidates at the council level are complaining about how impossible it is to raise money, that amount is formidable--as are the group’s ready-to-roll grass-roots operation and recent track record.

Five of the current council members are from SMRR, and the group has a chance to pick up a sixth seat if all four of its favored sons and daughters are elected.

The SMRR slate features the two incumbents on the ballot, Mayor Ken Genser and Mayor Pro Tem Judy Abdo, Planning Commissioner Paul Rosenstein and political newcomer Ellen Goldin.

Each has an independent campaign as well, but it is the organization’s money that primes the pump by letting the city’s largest voter group--the renters--know who is on the SMRR team.

Handicapping the SMRR slate’s prospects is difficult, however. Incumbency seems no more popular in Santa Monica this year than anywhere else. Moreover, many residents are furious at what they perceive as the inability or unwillingness of the current SMRR-dominated council to come to grips with the many problems involving the city’s homeless.

In a normal year, name recognition alone would give incumbents Genser and Abdo a huge advantage over such a large group of challengers. This year, it’s anyone’s guess.

Rosenstein also enjoys widespread name recognition because Planning Commission meetings are televised on a local cable channel. But that could cut both ways for him because he has irked a few neighborhood associations by being insufficiently opposed to development to suit them. Though he had to struggle for the SMRR and Democratic Club endorsements, Rosenstein has shown an ability to raise his own money, with $9,500 in the bank at the end of last month.

Unlike many SMRR candidates, Rosenstein was able to raise substantial sums from the business community, particularly restaurants, because he is viewed by them as a voice of moderation in the group. He also has the support of retiring Councilman Dennis Zane.

By contrast, Goldin is not well-known, and she comes from the slower-growth side of SMRR. She is a recent appointee to the board that oversees the Third Street Promenade.

The large candidates’ field has the potential to work to the advantage of the non-SMRR candidates, because it will take fewer votes to win--some say 5,000 fewer than two years ago. That means that a united vote by homeowners could elect some council members.

“I think we’ll pick up a minimum of two seats,” said retiring Councilman Herb Katz, a longtime SMRR critic.

The task for the challengers is raising enough money to come to the fore of the pack--and to get a campaign message through to voters who are being bombarded with information from other state and national races.

In an effort to become an instant household name, Weston had put $27,000 of his own money into his campaign by the end of September. Three Weston mailers have already gone out, with the first one appropriately saying, “Just Who Is Alan Weston?”

The candidate who had raised the most money--nearly $40,000--by the end of last month is Pyne, who has been working on his council bid for a long time. He also seems to be the one challenger SMRR seems to be concentrating its firepower on.

Another newcomer who is carving a niche for herself on the stump is Asha Greenberg, a quotable Los Angeles prosecutor running on public safety issues. But she had less than $5,000 on hand a few weeks ago, so her success could depend on whether she has enough money for a mail blitz.

Councilman Katz said he believes Pyne has the best shot of beating the SMRR machine, with Greenberg second--if she has the money--and Weston third.

A fourth newcomer, Anthony Blain, has the endorsement of the county Democratic Committee and State Sen. Herschel Rosenthal (D-Los Angeles), which should help with countywide slate mailers, but as of the end of the last filing period he had raised little money.