It’s Not Orange County Politics As Usual : Campaign Finance Reform Forces Supervisorial Hopefuls to Reach Out to More Voters

The race for the 2nd Supervisorial District in Orange County is proving to be an object lesson in the effects of recent campaign finance reform. The county’s 1992 campaign reforms limited individual contributions to $1,000 per candidate for every election cycle.

In past supervisorial races, candidates built up huge war chests and this time they are still substantial, but not as much as in 1986, when last there was an open supervisorial seat. In that election, the two top candidates spent a combined total of more than $1 million.

Campaign officials recently said that Linda Moulton Patterson, the mayor of Huntington Beach, had raised about $268,000 for the primary and general election races, and Jim Silva, a Huntington Beach city councilman, had raised $260,000.

The two are nearly equal in dollar amounts, and they have a lesser total overall than the candidates did in 1986. But there is a larger change evident in this election. Supporters and opponents of campaign reform seem to agree that the way these campaigns are being financed is very different because of the new spending limit.

That necessarily has to be a good thing for the public. The result seems to be more time spent on public debates and community forums to reach voters, and less on expensive mailers. No wonder William R. Mitchell, chairman of the Orange County Common Cause political watchdog group says: “This is how campaigns should be run.”

Not everyone agrees that what is happening is a good thing. Political consultants on both sides of the supervisorial race have lamented the additional burden it has put on their campaigns to get their message out.

However, it must be clear that the public is well served by the idea of spreading the money base out, and of not having special interests dominating the landscape as sources of funds. While developers and other special interests are still players, their contributions are limited, and that must contribute to the perception of a sense of obligation to a broader group of supporters.

The consultants don’t like it; they have to work harder to get to the same places. The candidates have to spend more time trying to raise money. But the sense of allegiances that the candidates feel is what’s most important. This reform takes it largely out of the hands of a few wealthy special-interest groups. And who better to owe than a broad constituency of ordinary citizens, the very people elected officials are supposed to serve?