Some Question Consistency of Silva’s Tax Stand

In mid-April, Supervisor Jim Silva went before the Cypress School District board and seemed to ask members to support Measure R.

“I think we pay enough in [taxes in] Orange County,” he told the board. “But I have to tell you that the hole is so deep and so wide I don’t know how we can get out of it without this sales tax.

“So if you can find it in your heart to support that, I think that’s one way . . . we can get out of this crisis a lot faster than if we stay in bankruptcy for five years.”

Two weeks later, Silva led the Pledge of Allegiance at the initial strategy session for Citizens Against the Tax Increase, the Republican and business group leading the opposition to the half-cent sales tax hike.

“Philosophically, I felt I had to vote to put Measure R on the ballot, but I am opposed to tax and fee increases,” he told The Times the day after the May 3 strategy session. “While I am not coming out real hard against Measure R, philosophically, I don’t support new tax and fee increases.”

When school board members in the Cypress district read of the breakfast strategy meeting in Newport Beach, most were surprised. At least two felt tricked and two would later call him a hypocrite. Only one board member said in an interview last week that Silva had not urged the board to support Measure R during his brief visit to Cypress.

Ventura Cornejo Jr., a board trustee since 1970, was annoyed. “I felt kind of betrayed,” he said. “Here is a person who asked us to support it. Then he goes and changes his mind. . . . If he didn’t enthusiastically support it, why was he asking us to support it?”

The incident in Cypress, which apparently was presaged by similar confusion during a Principal-For-A-Day dinner in March in Huntington Beach, illustrates how Silva has left differing impressions of his views on the tax increase during the past two months.

In an interview Friday, Silva rejected the idea that his position has ever varied.

“You know, I have spoken to over 5,000 people in the past several weeks and, in that time, I have never endorsed Measure R,” he said. “I campaigned for supervisor as a tax fighter and I really remain opposed to this tax increase.

“When the matter first came to the board in March, I expressed my opposition to the tax and remain personally opposed to Measure R.

”. . . . If anyone has ever come away with a different perception, that is not my intention,” he said.

Silva did announce his opposition to the sales tax hike on March 21, but it was not widely reported. It came as he voted to give first passage to Measure R.

“I do not support the tax,” he said near the end of a two-page statement. “I do support the taxpayers’ right to express their opinions.”

There was much more attention on his position and that of Supervisor Roger R. Stanton a week later, when theirs were the critical votes needed to place Measure R on the ballot. There was live TV coverage of the meeting.

At the time, Silva never stated his opposition to the tax. During that marathon public hearing on March 28, Silva declared he was torn. He stated his opposition to taxes in general but acknowledged that state Treasurer Matt Fong and others had warned him that the county could not afford to default on the more than $1 billion in bonds coming due this summer.

“I do think that the people of Orange County are already taxed enough,” he said, just before announcing his decision to support putting the measure on the ballot. “But with the financial crisis, I think it is an exception to the rule. I hate it. I think it’s disgusting. I think some way we’re going to be able to work it out without having to go for a long period of time on this half-cent sales tax.”

Measure R would raise some $130 million a year as part of the bankruptcy recovery package crafted by Chief Executive Officer William J. Popejoy.

The plan is especially crucial to the county’s three dozen school districts, which had all of their funds in the county’s failed bond pool and expect to get back only 90 cents on the dollar if the sales tax does not pass.

Between the supervisors’ vote on March 28 and Silva’s visit to the Cypress school board on April 18, there were news accounts about Silva’s position on Measure R. The general view was that Silva had yet to take a stand on the tax now that it was on the ballot. Silva went to Cypress to bestow a county proclamation on businessman George Briggeman, who had donated $10,000 to the Cypress Education Foundation.

During a brief address before honoring Briggeman, four board members say Silva asked them to back the sales tax measure.

“The essence of what he said is that he was hoping we would support the tax measure,” said board member Donna Erickson, who feels no animosity toward Silva and said he has a right to modify his position or evolve his views.

Board member Ellen R. Friedmann, however, said she felt tricked, angry and surprised when she read of Silva’s opposition.

“Talk about hypocrites,” she said. “You can’t have it both ways, Jim. Take a position. It is very discouraging. Leaders have to take a position.

”. . . . It looks like he is saying one thing to one group and another to another.”

Alone among the board members, Chairman Edward K. Southfield said the supervisor “wasn’t taking a stance” but rather was asking all municipal and school systems to support his decision to place the measure on the ballot.

“He was speaking in generalities and this could help us get out of this debacle and there were other avenues to pursue,” he said. “What Mr. Silva said is a fine line and could be interpreted in many ways, as with what anyone says.”

Silva said it is not surprising that different people have different accounts of what he said. “If you have an accident staged in front of 20 people, you are going to have 20 different opinions about what happened,” he said.

Comments by Silva to two school board members at a dinner in March led them to believe he was soliciting their support for the tax. The situation occurred at a Huntington Beach Union High School District affair at the Waterfront Hilton.

Michael S. Simons, school board president, said Silva told school officials and others who were seated with him at the dinner that it was important for them to support Measure R.

Officials in both districts, neither of which has taken an official stand on the ballot measure, expressed their concern about a lack of leadership coming from the Board of Supervisors. Only Supervisor Marian Bergeson is actively campaigning for Measure R.

Supervisors William G. Steiner and Gaddi H. Vasquez have expressed support for the tax. Supervisor Roger R. Stanton has not yet taken a position.

“I think they need to stand up,” said Donna McDougall, a Cypress trustee for nine years. “There is all this talk of recall. They should stand up and take a position and not be afraid of this. That’s the job they were elected to do.”

Simons said the supervisors “need to show leadership from the top. . . . To wait for a groundswell of support from lower officials before making a decision [on Measure R] is not leadership from the top.”

Silva said it has never been his purpose to tell people how to vote on the tax hike.

“It was my intention that night, as it is all along, that everyone should look within themselves to find a position that they can live with in their hearts and minds.

“I have consistently acknowledged that the sales tax increase is one option [for getting] out of the bankruptcy faster, and that is why I placed it on the ballot.”