Popejoy’s Schedule Is Taxing, but at Least He Eats Well

William Popejoy’s office called at midmorning. He was scheduled for the North Santa Ana Rotary Club at noon last Wednesday but wanted to let them know he was running a little behind.

As it turned out, Popejoy showed up in plenty of time. In plenty of time for another luncheon (barbecue chicken chili and snapper were the buffet choices) to discuss the proposed sales-tax increase. In plenty of time to try and persuade balky voters that an extra half-cent on the dollar is the cheapest way out of Orange County’s bankruptcy.

And, ultimately, in plenty of time to see just how far behind he really is.

Popejoy is on the talk circuit almost every day, trying to sell the tax to a public that doesn’t want it, to a Board of Supervisors that won’t get behind it and to city and school officials that aren’t quite sure what they want. Please, don’t get him started on the quality of leadership among elected officials in Orange County.

Popejoy was 56 when he took the job, without pay, as Orange County’s chief executive officer. He’ll be roughly 102 by the time the June 27 vote on Measure R rolls around. To Popejoy, this complicated issue has become simple, if unpopular: “Why am I for the sales tax?” he says to the Rotarians. “I believe it is the cheapest way out of our problem.”

By now, he can do the talk in his sleep. How if anyone had told him three months ago that as a wealthy conservative Republican from Newport Beach, he’d be supporting a sales tax, he would have thought them crazy. . . . How it is the county’s moral obligation to pay off the impending $1-billion debt to the bondholders and how the half-cent tax would be the least painful and most sensible way to do it. . . . How county government needs to be restructured and that the budget already has been cut 41% in three months and that the work force has been cut in half. . . . And, finally, how there simply isn’t enough money from other sources to make up the needed revenue.

Popejoy is followed to the microphone by Bruce Whitaker of Fullerton, one of the leaders of the anti-tax forces. He laments Popejoy’s support of the tax, saying the anti-tax Committees of Correspondence, of which he’s a member, originally supported Popejoy’s appointment. “For whatever reason,” Whitaker says, “he did a 180-degree turn and decided to cheerlead for a new tax.”

Whitaker’s pitch is that taxes are too high, that Popejoy is too pessimistic about generating revenue from other sources, and that he’s overstating the problem of delaying bond repayment. Whitaker says an additional tax will drain money from the economy and adds that, “We’re not walking away from our bond debt; we’re just taking a longer time to pay it off.”

Whitaker says the public needs to “call their bluff on this tax” and solve the problem “the old-fashioned way.” Popejoy laments later that while Whitaker is a “very decent guy,” he just doesn’t understand the intricacies of the financial situation and the potential fallout.

During a question-and-answer period, a skeptical audience member asks Popejoy how he can guarantee the tax will be lifted in 10 years. “I can’t believe it,” Popejoy quips, “I’ve only been in government for two months and already you don’t trust me.”

He gets a big laugh, but he who jokes confesses. He probably knows instinctively that his biggest problem is in trying to sell a tax to voters who have little confidence in their elected officials.

Indeed, the loudest applause comes when moderator Gordon Bricken suggests that “We let these two run the county and get rid of the supervisors.”

After both have made their pitches, the Rotarians vote. Thirty-two oppose the tax, with 23 in favor--roughly 60-40 against and pretty much where countywide polls have settled in.

And yet, there’s a small victory. Rotarian Robert Miller comes up to Popejoy afterward and says he’s a lifelong conservative Republican who’s been opposed to the tax. He says, however, that he didn’t realize the county had already made such deep cuts. He says Whitaker didn’t address the problem with as much specificity as Popejoy did. The opposition just seems to be philosophically anti-tax, but fuzzy on solving the problem, Miller says.

Miller tells Popejoy that he’s won him over.

Popejoy thanks him and later makes his way to the parking lot, no doubt thinking two things: that he’s still running behind, but that maybe he can catch up. The question is whether there’s enough time and luncheons left to reach the other Bob Millers in Orange County.

Dana Parsons’ column appears Wednesday, Friday and Sunday.