Whiff of State Health Chief’s Past Makes Smoking Foes Gag

Hoping to mobilize opposition to Gov. Pete Wilson’s new health director, anti-smoking advocates began circulating videotapes Monday that show her attacking a department report on the health costs of smoking.

On the tapes Kimberly Belshe, a spokeswoman for the tobacco industry’s 1988 campaign against Proposition 99, the anti-smoking initiative, suggests that the release of the report by a predecessor, former Health Services Director Dr. Kenneth Kizer, had been timed to help supporters of the ballot measure.

“We view Dr. Kizer’s report as really a political ploy orchestrated by the proponents of Proposition 99 to gain free media attention,” she tells a San Francisco television interviewer who asked her to comment on the findings. In the report, Kizer estimates the cost of cigarette smoking at $7.1 billion and 31,000 lives a year.

In another interview taped that same year, Belshe contends that the medical industry and others are jumping on “the anti-smoking bandwagon” so they can push for new taxes to finance their pet projects. The interviews were aired on San Francisco Bay Area news telecasts.

Belshe made the comments while working for the San Francisco public relations firm Ogilvy & Mather and serving as a spokeswoman for the opponents to the initiative, which were led and financed by the tobacco industry.

Anti-smoking advocates led by the 15,000-member Americans for Nonsmokers’s Rights said the tapes show that Belshe is unqualified for the new post, which, among other things, requires her to implement the anti-smoking programs mandated by Proposition 99. Under previous directors, the health department has used Proposition 99 funds to buy hard-hitting television ads depicting the health hazards of smoking.

The nonsmokers’ group said it fears that the department’s anti-smoking message could be weakened under Belshe. “Entrusting Ms. Belshe with the Proposition 99 health education campaign is like giving the fox the keys to the henhouse,” said Julia Carol, co-director of the organization. “We call on the governor to withdraw Ms. Belshe’s nomination.”

Although she did not recall making the anti-Proposition 99 statement, Belshe insisted that none of her comments during the heat of the campaign were “directed at the quality of the science or the conclusions” of the report.

Nor, she said, did she mean to question the personal credentials of Kizer, a “highly competent” health professional who served during the Administration of former Gov. George Deukmejian.

“My comments were directed at the use of that report in the broader political context . . . at the eleventh hour of the campaign,” she said.

Proposition 99 was approved overwhelmingly by the voters.

Belshe, a nonsmoker who contends that she is a strong opponent of smoking, said she still opposes, as she did in 1988, “ballot box taxation” that takes taxing and spending flexibility away from the Legislature. Proposition 99 provided funds for a variety of programs, including the anti-smoking advertising campaign, through a 25% hike in the cigarette tax.

Rallying to her defense have been a number of health care groups, including the largest physician organization, the California Medical Assn.; the California Assn. of Hospitals and Health Systems and Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California.

Legislators have been generally silent on the appointment, with the exception of Assemblyman Phil Isenberg (D-Sacramento).

Isenberg, who sponsored legislation to carry out the provisions of Proposition 99, described her as a vigorous supporter of all of its provisions. “It was outrageous that she is being tarred,” he said.

Belshe’s appointment must be confirmed by the Senate.