Hurtt Gets Closer Scrutiny in 32nd Senate Seat Race : Politics: O.C. businessman’s persona emerges. Foes say sole Republican candidate is devoted to Christian right.

What a difference a decade makes. Back in the early ‘80s, Rob Hurtt was a typical Orange County industrialist, nose to the business grindstone. Then he got the bug--a bug of the political variety.

It began by contributing to candidates--a few hundred dollars here, a few hundred there. In 1987, Hurtt helped found an institute in Sacramento to lobby for the family values he holds dear. The political fever peaked last year, when Hurtt gave more than $500,000 to a broad slate of conservative Republican candidates, most of them sharing his strong Christian beliefs.

Now, Hurtt figures, it’s his turn. With a hefty personal bankroll and the support of Orange County’s Republican hierarchy, Hurtt appears poised to waltz into the state Senate seat at stake in a March special election.

The wealthy businessman is the only Republican in the race for the 32nd Senate District, which includes the cities of Fullerton, Garden Grove and Santa Ana. The half-dozen Democratic and third-party challengers are political paupers in comparison.

Even as he seeks to succeed freshly minted U.S. Rep. Ed Royce (R-Fullerton) in the state Legislature, Hurtt’s public persona has just begun to emerge.

Supporters say the 48-year-old owner of Container Supply Co. in Garden Grove is a pragmatic, hard-working businessman who wants to tackle the bureaucratic and regulatory excesses of Sacramento, the sort of citizen-politician envisioned when voters approved the state’s term-limits law.

“His interest in politics stems from his frustration with over-regulation and workers’ compensation problems that are being visited on California businessmen,” said Assemblyman Mickey Conroy (R-Orange), who has endorsed Hurtt. “We need more people up in Sacramento who know what it means to run a business.”

“He’s as nice a guy as you’d ever want to meet and tough as nails when it comes to the business side of things,” said John Stoos, executive director of Gunowners of California, a 50,000-member gun rights group that works on conservative causes. “He’s frustrated that Sacramento just is not listening to businessmen.”

But opponents say Hurtt is holding back his full agenda. They contend Hurtt is deeply devoted to the religious right and intends to push a Bible-based platform of anti-abortion, anti-gay rights and anti-pornography beliefs. As proof, they point to Hurtt’s support of Christian candidates and note how he earned a spot on evangelist Pat Robertson’s list of nominees for the Republican National Convention (Hurtt didn’t attend and says he wasn’t even aware he made the list).

“He’s trying to hide it from voters--that he’s a far-right fundamentalist candidate,” said George Urch, chief of staff for Assemblyman Tom Umberg (D-Garden Grove). “I think Hurtt is a true believer. He comes from the Christian right. He’s part of their team. And they’re anti-anything that’s different than them.”

Even some Republicans are wary.

“Rumor coming to me is that he is not a big-tent Republican, that he comes from the hard right, is anti-women, anti-choice, intolerant of Republicans who don’t meet his very narrow perspective,” said Roger Hughes, Orange County president of the moderate California Republican League. “If the rumors are true, we hope Mr. Hurtt can see the wisdom of reaching out to the moderate wing of the party.”

Others suggest, however, that Hurtt is focused on improving the business climate in California, not pressing a Bible-based social program.

“I do not see him jousting at windmills,” said Tom Fuentes, Orange County Republican Party chairman. “His agenda is very realistic--he’s concerned with the economy and government matters. I have never known him to wear his religion on his sleeve.”

Sara DiVito Hardman, state director of the Christian Coalition, predicted that Hurtt would not prove to be a strident advocate of the religious right. “I think he’s a good conservative, no question,” she said. “But I would not say that Rob is an extremist. I think he’s coming to politics more from a business perspective.”

For his part, Hurtt appears weary of the hubbub over his moral and political beliefs. The father of four, he is certainly worried about the direction society has taken in the age of MTV. But he doesn’t see his role as that of a political evangelist.

“I don’t think (Christianity) is the answer for everyone. I know it isn’t,” Hurtt said. “There’s this fear among certain groups that Christians want to be in office so they can push their beliefs on others. That’s totally wrong. What I’m interested in is re-establishing some moral values, and those aren’t exclusive to Christianity by a long shot.”

A native Southern Californian, Hurtt is heir to an industrial success story. His grandfather worked for years as a sales manager for American Can Co. in Los Angeles, then in 1954 helped Hurtt’s father set up an offshoot with some used equipment destined for the scrap pile.

The firm, which manufactured cans and containers for everything from paint to hand soap, prospered. Hurtt worked his way up the ranks--packing, loading trucks, working the assembly line, typing invoices. During the ‘70s the company grew tenfold, led by his father’s conservative philosophy of plowing profits back into the business and strictly avoiding financing any improvements with bank loans.

By the early ‘80s, Hurtt took over for his father, helping make improvements that brought the firm to where it is today, generating revenue of $23 million annually. Its specialty is large, industrial-size cans for restaurant food, although the firm’s most visible product is the stylish pink containers used for Almond Roca candy.

Until recently, Hurtt was so busy running a business that he didn’t have time to ponder the way of the world around him. “I was ignorant,” Hurtt admits. “As a typical middle-class businessman, you work and play and you don’t really realize the significance of a lot of things.”

But as his children entered high school, he became increasingly disturbed by the problems they faced. Gangs, drugs, schoolyard shootings--it eclipsed the sorts of problems Hurtt faced as a teen-ager. He was also growing miffed by government’s relationship with free enterprise. At times the regulatory agencies seemed intent on simply hurting business.

He started taking the family every Sunday to a local Presbyterian Church. Formerly pro-choice on abortion, Hurtt began studying the issues and eventually adopted more conservative Christian beliefs.

He also began dabbling in politics. Hurtt supported conservative Republican candidates and helped form Capitol Resource Institute, a registered lobbying organization in Sacramento dedicated to supporting “those values of the Judeo-Christian ethic” that improve the welfare of families. Hurtt has consistently donated about $100,000 annually to the cause.

His donations to political candidates crested during 1992. Early in the year, Hurtt left operation of his firm to a cadre of vice presidents and devoted most of his waking hours to working with three other affluent businessmen to back conservative Republican candidates for the Assembly.

The group, dubbed Capital Commonwealth, includes wealthy Orange County philanthropist Howard Fieldstead Ahmanson Jr., heir of the Home Savings of America empire. Hurtt not only donated a huge sum of money to the cause in 1992 (“I shot my wad,” he says today.), but also spent hours interviewing candidates.

The effort yielded victories in more than half of the races where Capital Commonwealth focused its money. The winners are a virtual who’s who of conservative Republicans in the Assembly.

Among those getting money from Hurtt and his associates were GOP Assembly members Larry Bowler of Sacramento ($97,500), Ted Weggeland of Riverside ($50,000), Bill Hoge of Los Angeles ($25,500) and Kathleen Honeycutt of Inyo County ($17,500). Orange County legislators Conroy ($16,300), Curt Pringle ($29,700), Bill Morrow ($28,500), Ross Johnson ($5,000) and John Lewis ($3,000) also benefited from the group’s largess.

If Hurtt joins those lawmakers in Sacramento, some critics predict he could be an exceptionally influential freshman as a result of his contributions.

“I think he will indeed be able to call in some political favors,” said Jerry Sloan, a gay activist in Sacramento who monitors the activities of the religious right. “They certainly owe Hurtt and the others a great deal.”

Fuentes and other Republican supporters of Hurtt chafe at the notion. “I know the integrity of the man, and I don’t think it’s in the nature of his character to have anyone beholden to him,” Fuentes said.

Hurtt ruffled a few Republican feathers when he decided to enter the race for the 32nd Senate District seat.

Many local Republicans had settled on Brian Bennett, Rep. Robert K. Dornan’s former chief of staff, as their candidate. Hurtt, however, felt Bennett only wanted to use the Senate spot as a steppingstone to Congress and lacked business experience. He was also worried that Bennett, a bachelor, didn’t have the “perspective” of someone who is married and raising children.

Two weeks after Hurtt declared his candidacy in late December, Bennett dropped out, saying there was no way he could outspend a millionaire.

“I think Rob Hurtt showed political savvy being able to clear the field like that and virtually assure a win,” said Stoos of Gunowners of California. “Writing a big check keeps people out.”

But not everyone. Although his opponents from other parties lack as much financial clout, they are expected to batter Hurtt for his ties to the Christian right.

When questioned about his beliefs, Hurtt doesn’t gloss over anything.

He said he would favor repeal of gay-rights legislation signed last year by Gov. Pete Wilson, but mostly because it gives “the fringe weirdo another avenue to attack business and cause a lot of litigation.”

Unabashedly anti-abortion, Hurtt would like to see the state adopt a law requiring parental consent before a teen-ager could seek an abortion.

Meanwhile, he feels legislative efforts to require prayer in school would “be bastardized” by Sacramento lawmakers. At best, he said, a school prayer bill would be “watered down so it would become a moment of silence or something like that.”

Instead, he favors adopting a system of school vouchers, government tax rebates that parents could use to send their children to private schools. “If you want your kids to pray, then you could use the voucher and choose which school they go to,” he said.

Hurtt also said he wishes that biblical creationism was taught alongside evolutionary theory in schools. “Evolution is a theory and there’s some pretty big gaps, and it takes as much or more imagination to say that’s the way we came about as with creationism,” he said. Although some groups will push for him to champion the issue, Hurtt said, he doubts he’ll take up the cause.

Instead, Hurtt hopes to focus almost exclusively on righting the wrongs he feels Sacramento has done to business. Most notably, he wants to see the elimination of workers’ compensation stress claims and limits on the vast powers of Southern California’s air quality regulators.

“Hopefully, I can bring a true businessman’s perspective,” Hurtt said. “When I talk about workers’ compensation-types of situations and over-regulation and the AQMD, it’s things that have happened to my firm. Hopefully I can bring some validity to it.”