The Earthquake Revives the Tax-and-Spend Debate

Just as the 1992 riots redefined the dynamics of Los Angeles’ mayoral election, the Northridge earthquake may reshape the 1994 race for gover nor. The pre-quake hot-button issues of crime and immigration, though still potent, have slid a notch or two down California’s political agenda. Taxes and government are moving up.

The basic debate appears to center on what constitutes “good government.” Where does responsibility for Southern California’s recovery lie? Who should care for its residents’ needs? Who should pay? How? How much? It’s been quite a while--indeed, too long--since a political campaign in California raised such fundamental questions of governing.

Still, to listen to some political observers, you’d think the governmental responses to the earthquake were engineered just to improve the position of certain politicians heading into an election year. But when events become the driving force, it’s harder for candidates to define themselves.

Certainly, Gov. Pete Wilson and one Democratic challenger, state Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi, have logged heavy media time as they have gone about their jobs. The leadership stage was legitimately theirs--and they took it. But if the recovery stumbles, they’ll be tarred with failure.

Garamendi lags behind Wilson and state Treasurer Kathleen Brown, another Democratic gubernatorial contender, in fund-raising. He needs visibility, and the earthquake gave it to him. Brown, on the other hand, appeared absent from battle during the critical days after the temblor. Perhaps it was because the media dismissed her office as irrelevant to crisis management. Or perhaps the Brown campaign realized that high-flying maneuvers by a public official on the periphery could backfire politically.

“Toughness” has been a byword of Wilson’s term in office. And in the past two weeks, he has looked good as a crisis manager. Fifty-eight percent of Los Angeles County residents surveyed by The Los Angeles Times Poll approved of the governor’s post-quake performance. Nonetheless, what could have been a major political plus for Wilson may not turn out that way. A clue to his problem lies in the 70%-plus approval ratings respondents gave President Bill Clinton and Mayor Richard Riordan.

In the disaster’s aftermath, Clinton and Riordan both showed “connectivity,” the ability to relate to people and their concerns on an emotional level and to sound credible doing it. Voters look for connectivity in their leaders, especially during a crisis.

Wilson lacks that ability. Garamendi, with his faded jeans and rolled-up shirt sleeves, is trying to persuade voters that he has it. Brown is nothing if not warm and fuzzy--relentlessly connecting.

But Wilson understands that Californians are not going to vote for him because he’s lovable. So he’s tried to differentiate himself on issues that concern voters more than bedside manner. For example, he clearly had the momentum on crime, with his main target being Brown. But the earthquake may have given her a reprieve, however brief, from Wilson’s attacks.

The quake’s damage has helped to make taxes a defining issue among the candidates. Wilson is pushing hard--some say too hard--for the federal government to pick up all recovery costs. He has shied away from any tax increases to pay for earthquake repairs, while talking up the possibility of placing a bond issue on the June ballot.

Leaving himself the kind of wiggle room the hapless George Bush never did, Wilson recently contended, “At a time when Californians are attempting to recover from a recession, we don’t need additional tax burdens.”

Brown has taken a similarly cautious stance on taxes, although separating herself from Wilson’s hard line on federal government support. She has called for immediate use of unsold bond funds and loans from state programs to rebuild schools and other public agencies.

Garamendi, as befits the perceived underdog in the Democratic race, has taken the biggest political risk. Insisting an election-year tax increase is necessary to pay for earthquake recovery, he is setting up taxes as a potential wedge issue in the Democratic gubernatorial primary. “Anybody who says we are going to do this without a temporary tax increase,” he lectured a recent Washington news conference, “is either a fool or a liar.”

The last politician who was that honest about raising taxes was Walter F. Mondale, when he accepted the 1984 presidential nomination of the Democratic Party. Ten years later, is talk of raising taxes still political suicide?

The Times Poll indicates there is some support for an earthquake-repair levy, even in quake-affected communities traditionally home to more conservative, anti-tax, high-propensity voters. Sixty-four percent of the respondents in the San Fernando and Santa Clarita valleys indicated they would support a one-year, one-quarter-cent sales tax (as compared with 68% of all L.A. County respondents). And 49% supported raising the gas tax by 2 to 4 cents a gallon (as compared with 52% of all L.A. County respondents).

There’s some electoral evidence that voters will support higher taxes tied to programs that directly benefit them. In 1990, for example, Californians approved an increase in the state gas tax to pay for transportation projects, and last year they supported a one-half-cent sales tax to be used for public-safety programs. Will the quake have a similar effect on white, middle-class voters whose lives have been disrupted?

Another critical issue that has surfaced in the post-quake political debate is the relevance of government to the lives of these people. In some respects, the Northridge quake has functioned as a great equalizer. “Amateur” homeless, as the middle-class dispossessed are derisively called, have joined the ranks of street people. And it has been government that has stepped in to supply them with water, housing and money--things they thought their tax dollars bought only for less-deserving “others.”

Will this brush with government activism score politically with hard-hit suburban voters? Currently, public perception of the government’s post-earthquake action appears to be positive. Fifty-nine percent of The Times Poll respondents (61% in the Valley) approved of the activities of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Eighty-four percent rated government agencies’ efforts to repair freeways as excellent or good.

If that perception holds--and there’s still a long way to go--it could signal a change of heart among cynical California voters. Politically, increased approval of government activism could benefit Democrats this year, particularly in close legislative and congressional elections.

Events since Jan. 17 have underscored, once again, that good government is good politics. The problem is that Californians, and their political leaders, are far from consensus on exactly what good government is. If they can move beyond the sloganeering and simplistic posturing that dominated state politics before the quake hit and seriously debate what good government is, this election campaign could signal that California has finally begun to turn itself around.*