He’s in No Rush to Seek a Higher Seat, Vasquez Says

Since his appointment seven years ago, Orange County Supervisor Gaddi H. Vasquez has come to embody nearly unlimited political potential in California.

A bedrock conservative in one of the nation’s most Republican strongholds, Vasquez has been seen as someone who could appeal to California’s fast-growing Latino population. Just a year after he took office, officials talked about statewide office for Vasquez by 1994, then a bid for governor.

It’s 1994 and Vasquez remains an Orange County supervisor. And the talk has turned to speculation about his missed opportunities, unwillingness to take risks and uncertain political future.

One of the supervisor’s closest friends, lobbyist Randy Smith, recently suggested that Vasquez has been contemplating an exit from government into private business.

Smith said he believes Vasquez has grown increasingly concerned with the declining “esteem” ascribed to political figures and has been exploring other opportunities.

“Most people have this perception that Gaddi is a career politician,” Smith said. “I think they would be shocked to learn that politics now is one of a number of competing interests.”

But Vasquez strongly denies any such wayward thinking, saying that he is “befuddled” that anyone would think such a thing.

“I’ve heard these things before, mostly from the press,” Vasquez said. “I am always kind of puzzled by people who want me to move along. But I think the general public is tired of seeing politicians who use one office to jump to another.”

The 39-year-old former Orange policeman said he intends to seek reelection when his term expires in 1996.

The decision to remain on the Board of Supervisors, rather than seek higher office, has been largely a personal one, he said. The most recent opportunity came when Vasquez was approached to run for statewide office with Gov. Pete Wilson this year.

“People who are political watchers, I guess, place a higher value on attaining higher political office than in raising a child,” Vasquez said, referring to his 14-year-old son. “My child will not be a casualty of my political ambition. I’m still in my 30s, relatively young. . . . What’s the rush?”

Speculation about Vasquez’s future has always been somewhat of a sport in Orange County, but rarely have his colleagues, local political consultants and friends talked so strongly about their feelings of frustration with his decisions to pass on higher office or wondered aloud about his continuing interest in government.

“He has passed up opportunities so many times,” said Dan Wooldridge, a local political consultant and former longtime aide to county supervisors. “There is a clock ticking out there. Gaddi has not been aggressively pursuing things nor has he been as energetic on some issues.”

Supervisor Thomas F. Riley said that while he cannot imagine Vasquez working outside of government, there is a sense that “things have not fallen in place the way (Vasquez) hoped.”

“I always felt that his goal was to get a position in the public eye,” Riley said, referring to the oft-rumored opportunities for Vasquez in the former Bush Administration. “There are people in Orange County who don’t know him.”

Although a local consultant representing candidates of an opposing political stripe, Jeff Adler said that Vasquez has always represented a local political force but has remained virtually untested since his appointment by Gov. George Deukmejian in 1987.

“He has been considered the shooting star of the Republican Party, but he has not stepped out,” Adler said. “By and large, I think he is probably somewhat forgotten.”

Privately, others are more blunt in their assessments but prefer to remain anonymous because of their close association with Vasquez.

“I’m feeling that he’s losing interest after seven years,” said one local official. “He’s not been a happy camper. I get a sense that the business community feels like he can’t make a decision.”

Said another: “He’s really been frustrated by life in the fishbowl. He wants to get out and leave the crap behind.”

All of those assessments, Vasquez says, are simply not accurate.

He said he is concerned about how people view political figures these days. But that has not been enough to drive him away from public service.

Buck Johns, a leader in the politically influential Lincoln Club and a big contributor to local campaigns, said there will likely be other opportunities for Vasquez.

“There is no such thing as a limited number of shots,” Johns said. “Those of us who were trying to get one of the most articulate Hispanics who exist to run would have loved to see him on the statewide ticket. He would have been a wonderful addition. But I can’t fault the guy for thinking about it and coming to a decision. I wouldn’t do it.”

Johns said Vasquez’s speeches at the past two Republican National Conventions made the supervisor “a big name for us. . . . I’d be surprised if he left” government.

There are others, though, who have noticed an increasing hesitation by Vasquez to use his bank of political capital to tackle pressing concerns dogging the county.

More recently, and on a matter directly affecting his south-central county district, Vasquez could hardly be found as the early debate over who would control conversion planning for El Toro Marine Corps Air Station threatened to careen out of the supervisors’ control, Wooldridge said.

“On El Toro, he deferred to Riley,” Wooldridge said, referring to the supervisor whose South County district includes the military base. Vasquez “did not play a visible role.”

Vasquez’s early absence was noticed by South County officials and lampooned in a cartoon published by the Saddleback Valley News last fall.

Wooldridge said the most recent gauge of Vasquez’s apparent detachment from the issue might have been when Lincoln Club leaders approached the board to seek approval for a ballot measure that would allow voters to decide whether the base should be converted to a commercial airport.

“He was not among the first board members that the Lincoln Club people went to,” Wooldridge said.

Vasquez also chose to be silent last summer when the Orange County Grand Jury issued a controversial report on illegal immigration that called for a three-year moratorium on all immigration--legal and illegal--into the country.

All of the supervisors were slow to respond publicly to the report, but it was Vasquez--the only Latino on the board--whose silence was particularly noticeable.

But Vasquez said his silence has been misinterpreted, particularly on the issue of El Toro.

“The fact of the matter is that I was extensively involved in the El Toro issue,” he said. “I traveled to Washington. I spent a lot of time researching and gathering facts. It’s just not my style to engage in public exchanges until I’ve had the benefit of knowing all the facts.

“I think some people define leadership as ‘What have you done for me lately?’ ” he said.

Regarding the grand jury report, the supervisor said the board adequately addressed the issue when it released its written response, indicating that the county had little control over immigration issues.

“I consider myself very fortunate to serve in the county in which I was raised,” he said. “I like local government. I’m not in a hurry.”