In Last-Ditch Effort, Prop. 174 Backers Go on Offensive : Election: Financially strapped supporters of school vouchers measure complain about opponents’ tactics. Anti-174 campaign continues barrage of commercials and phone calls.

With their pockets empty and the political Establishment against them, supporters of the school vouchers initiative spent the final days before Tuesday’s election lashing out at the opponents.

Proposition 174’s backers attempted to portray a leading voucher critic as a hypocrite and accused the opposition of receiving stolen internal campaign memos.

Anti-voucher forces, meanwhile, continued their barrage of television ads and worked to ensure that those most likely to vote against Proposition 174 make it to the polls Tuesday.

In a massive drive to get out the vote, the sophisticated anti-174 campaign has placed more than 700,000 phone calls to registered voters, and mailed out more than 1 million absentee ballot requests.

By the time votes are counted, voucher foes led by the California Teachers Assn. and other public employee and school unions will have outspent proponents by more than 5 to 1, roughly $16 million to $3 million.

“If we had $14 million, I’d be sitting here confidently predicting a victory,” Ken Khachigian, chief of the Yes on 174 campaign, said in Sacramento last week. Given that his budget is far more modest, Khachigian said, “I’m sitting here confidently hoping for a victory.”

Khachigian, a veteran Republican campaign strategist, has tried to bring together a coalition of libertarians, conservative Christians and a smattering of conservatives and liberals displeased with public schools.

He said he has spent $550,000 on television, compared to about $6 million spent on TV commercials by opponents.

Trailing by more than 2 to 1 in recent polls, proponents were left to hope that opinion surveys failed to detect that those unhappy with public schools will turn out in unusually high numbers.

“There is an anger vote out there,” said Sam Hardage, a San Diego hotelier and one of the backers. “People are dissatisfied with the way big government has handled the affairs in this state.”

Opponents of Proposition 174 say that even if the system has problems, Proposition 174 represents a big unknown, one that would cost hundreds of millions dollars in the first years.

“This is no Proposition 13,” said Rick Manter, campaign manager for the No on 174 effort. “If there was a movement for this, we would have seen it.”

The initiative would create a constitutional amendment allowing parents to receive annual payments of about $2,600 in tax money toward each of their children’s tuition.

Proponents contend that vouchers would expand educational opportunities for poor people, and force public schools to improve or lose more students. Critics say the measure would allow virtually anyone to open a private school, and destroy the public system by draining money from it.

Television ads by opponents started airing in September. The average voter 35 years and older sees one of the commercials eight times a week, their research shows. The messages went unanswered until 10 days ago when the proponents aired their first commercials. But the pro-174 campaign had enough money only for television spots in Southern and Central California; none aired in the Bay Area.

Opponents won endorsements from Gov. Pete Wilson, President Clinton, two-thirds of the Legislature, the Democratic Party, scores of local city council and school board members, and groups ranging from the League of Women Voters and Common Cause to the Gray Panthers.

The California Republican Party endorsed 174. The lone statewide officeholder to come out for it was Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren.

“I didn’t do this for my own political benefit,” said Lungren, a product of Catholic schools. “I’ve had plenty of people tell me to not get involved in this--all you’re going to do is tick people off.”

Khachigian said that the pro-174 campaign has had to contend with persistent leaks of internal documents. The internal memos set forth strategy, reflected dissent, and revealed early that the 174 campaign was strapped for money.

Last week, Khachigian, who was a speech writer in the Richard Nixon White House, released details of what he described as political espionage, and likened the acts to Watergate.

“I just want the public to know who we’re dealing with,” Khachigian said. “These aren’t a bunch of schoolmarms. They play hardball.”

Proponents have asked the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office to investigate a private investigator who rented office space in Los Angeles from 174 treasurer Shawn Steel.

“We didn’t see a crime there,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Gail Ehrlich, who reviewed the case.

Donna Lucas, of No on 174’s campaign firm, Nelson & Lucas, denied the anti-174 campaign’s involvement in the leaks and called the charges “desperate,” adding: “They should be talking about the initiative if they want people to vote for it.”

In a final assault, Khachigian released documents showing that California Teachers Assn. President Del Weber operated a church called the Brotherhood of Peace and Tranquillity from his home.

Khachigian accused Weber of hypocrisy, noting that the campaign against the initiative warned that cults and cranks would be able to open voucher-accepting private schools.

“It’s a joke, just a sick, sad joke,” said Manter of the No on 174 campaign. “I guess they know they’re going to lose the election, and they’re going to try to assassinate someone’s character. They hope that, somehow, that is going to make things OK.”

In an interview, Weber, a former Anaheim High School mathematics teacher, said he was ordained as a minister in the 1950s and has performed occasional marriages and funerals for friends.

He stopped using the garage for a chapel years ago, he said, and has since moved a pool table into the space and, more recently, computer equipment. He said he never received tax breaks by setting up the nonprofit order.

“I don’t know what it would have proved if we were having church meetings and incantations,” Weber said. “It wouldn’t win them their election.”