Those Not at the Polls May Be Key to Measure R : Election: Record number of requests made for absentee ballots. Both campaigns aggressively target those voters.

Absentee voters are the key battleground in the Measure R election.

Early in the strategizing about the half-cent sales tax measure on the June 27 ballot, both sides decided to spend most of their campaign funds to win over the absentee vote, presuming it would be a crucial part of the electorate. Even so, they have been stunned by the heavy tide of mail-in voters.

So far, about 167,500 people have applied for absentee ballots, and almost 93,000 have already voted that way; both are runaway records for a special election in Orange County. As local political activists know, absentee voters typically make up one-third to one-half of the ballots cast in a special election like the one for Measure R.

By Tuesday’s mail-in deadline to file for an absentee ballot, the number of applicants could even surpass the 171,566 who received absentee ballots in the 1992 Presidential race.

“This is a huge number,” said Harvey Englander, an Orange County-based political consultant. “You must run an absentee ballot campaign in order to have any hope of success in virtually all contested races and . . . it has added significance in a special election like this one.”

The campaign to sway the hearts and minds of absentee voters is a little-understood phenomenon. It is a separate and distinct effort from the general campaign. It has its own deadlines, mailers and radio ads, and relies on sophisticated strategies for targeting voters.

It is no accident that absentee voters get a flood of mail a few days after they file for an absentee ballot. After all, the campaign consultants know--sometimes even before the registrar of voters--who is applying for those ballots.

The sophisticated mail-in voter drive over Measure R has its roots in a special election held in Long Beach in 1979. The race would fill the state Senate seat vacated by George Deukmejian, who had been elected state attorney general the year before. That Senate contest is acknowledged as the first in which mail-in ballots played a significant role, almost causing an upset of Republican Ollie Speraw by Democrat Renee Simon in the largely Republican district.

In 1978, the state Election Code had been changed to make it easier to vote by mail. The qualifications became pretty much what they are now; those who wanted to vote absentee could. Before that, to qualify for a mail-in ballot voters had to meet strict criteria about disability or absence from the area on Election Day.

After the Speraw election, the absentee vote was immediately seized upon by Republicans and became a key component in future election successes. When Deukmejian beat Tom Bradley in the 1982 gubernatorial race, Deukmejian actually lost at the polls; his 93,345-vote margin statewide came from mail-in ballots.

It is a truism in Orange County that tax questions lose in elections when turnout is low; and low turnout among the county’s 1.1 million registered voters is typical in special elections.

That’s because those who vote regularly in election after election, who tend to be older, better educated and richer, are generally anti-tax. Antipathy to taxes is also common among those who usually vote absentee.

From the outset, the Yes side on Measure R knew it had to fight for the absentee vote to win. It was part of an overall strategy to increase voter turnout both among absentees and at the polls on Election Day.

“It all comes down to who has the motivation to participate and how much you can move that through campaign appeals so that you widen the group that would otherwise vote in this election,” said Mark Baldassare, a UC Irvine professor who conducts the Times Orange County Poll.

Because this election is a one-issue contest held at an unusual time, the job of boosting turnout is even tougher.

Citizens for Economic Progress, the main Yes on R committee, headed by Sheriff Brad Gates, has spent about $1 million, more than two-thirds of its current funds, on a mail-ballot campaign.

“We would be dead [otherwise],” said Stu Mollrich of Butcher, Forde & Mollrich, which is running the campaign for that committee. “On an issue like this, we would not have a chance to win if we did not contest the absentee vote.”

There are two main components to an absentee-ballot campaign. The solicitation of voters to sign up to vote absentee, which is done by mailing them an absentee ballot application, and what insiders call “the chase.”

Butcher, Forde ran both.

As part of the solicitation, which began on May 15, it mailed more than 750,000 absentee ballot applications to individuals in key voter groups, whom it had determined through polling might be persuaded to favor the tax. The campaign used targeted mailers, sending specific cover letters along with the personalized ballot applications to different groups.

Republicans got a cover letter from County Chief Executive Officer William J. Popejoy, and women and Democrats got one from the League of Women Voters. Parents were addressed by Gates and Barbara Ledterman of the Orange County PTA. The campaign also ran radio spots pushing pro-tax arguments and its mail-ballot campaign.

Using historic lists of those who had voted in previous elections, the campaign was trying to reach those who typically vote when an election has a 60% turnout.

“We wanted to eliminate [mailings to] those who are unlikely to vote and avoid wasting money,” Mollrich said. “We were trying to motivate [people who don’t vote in every election] because we need them to win. The problem we have had from the beginning is we can’t win with the 30% who are higher-propensity voters.”

Besides the Gates committee, only the California Teachers Assn., which has endorsed Measure R, sent a solicitation. The CTA mailed them to its 16,000 members who are registered voters in the county.

The chase campaign began the day after Memorial Day.

Voters apply for an absentee ballot in two ways: either with the application sent by the campaign, or by using the one that came with the county sample ballot.

Sample ballot applications are mailed by voters directly to the registrar. The voter who uses the campaign application returns it to the campaign postage free; the campaign then delivers it within three days to the registrar of voters.

About 30 days before the election--because of the Memorial Day holiday it occurred May 30--the registrar began mailing out absentee ballots. On the same day, it made available lists of all who had applied for mail-in ballots.

The campaigns were waiting.

Using these lists bought from the registrar, both sides literally began to “chase” these potential absentee voters by mail and phone.

“I think a good chase program is just as good if not better than sending absentee solicitations, particularly if money is a problem.” said Dick Rosengarten, editor of Calpeek, a weekly newsletter for political insiders. “If money is not a problem, you send out the absentee application and do your own chase program.”

An advantage in running a solicitation campaign, as well, is getting several days’ head start to send a chase to the voter before a contrary political message shows up.

The committees seeking the defeat of Measure R, with their substantially smaller budgets, could employ only the thriftier chase tactic.

There were two chase campaigns by the tax opponents: a modest one run by Tom Rogers, who is associated with the Committees of Correspondence, and the other by Citizens Against the Tax Increase, a group backed by business people and Republican Party leaders.

Rogers’ group bought printed lists and used volunteers to address and mail its chase pieces. It sent a general critique of the tax to sample-ballot applicants. The campaign applicants got “a specific mailer designed to answer the Popejoy letter and the PTA letter,” Rogers said.

They also chased only Republicans. “We are limited in resources and have to go to those most likely to vote our way,” he said. “We will pick up Democrats and independents by virtue of mixed households.”

Citizens Against the Tax Increase did the same thing but mixed in some high-tech sophistication. They bought computer tapes and automatically generated personalized, laser-printed letters to every absentee. The group mailed 100,000 chase pieces in the first several days.

To counter the targeting by the Yes side, it is also mailing to its own group of high-propensity voters, which it identifies through surveys and voter history.

Mark Thompson, the political consultant running their campaign, said on Friday that to date he had spent all his resources, about $60,000, on the absentee campaign.

Using the computer lists, the campaign also ran a phone survey of absentee ballot applicants. It reportedly showed the tax running behind by a substantial margin among sample applicants, while leading slightly among campaign ballot applicants.

The tax proponents also ran chase campaigns. There was one by the CTA, another by Butcher, Forde, and a third by a separate committee called Public Safety for Yes on R, which is largely funded by police and lawyers’ groups.

Several times a week, each campaign has returned to the registrar, getting an updated list with the names and addresses of new applicants. It also lists those who have voted.

For them, the mail stops.

Dan Wooldridge, a consultant working for the public safety committee, said the basic challenge for the Yes side has been clear--boost the turnout.

Now that the mail-in vote is sure to approach 100,000, he said, “The good news could be that you are motivating new voters, or the bad news is it is the conservative anti-tax vote coming in in droves.

Arnie Steinberg, a pollster in Calabasas who works for Republicans statewide, assesses the situation bluntly:

“For the Yes side to win, they have to do something I have never seen done successfully in a tax-hike campaign--do respectably among absentee voters. The challenge they run into is, that short of some remarkable targeting, most of the absentee voters they are soliciting will vote against it.”

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Here’s How to Get a Ballot

Voters may request an absentee ballot in person at the county registrar of voters’ office until the close of business on June 27, Election Day.

Applications made by mail to the registrar must be postmarked no later than Tuesday, June 20.

The ballots themselves must be received by the registrar by 8 p.m. on Election Day. They may be handed-delivered or mailed.

The registrar’s office is at 1300 S. Grand Ave., Santa Ana, CA 92705.

The absentee ballot desk is downstairs in Building C, at Grand and McFadden avenues.

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ABSENTEE MINDED

More than 167,500 Orange County voters have already requested absentee ballots for the Measure R special election June 27. A look at past absentee voting:

Absentees Absentee % of all Election issued voters voters 1991 special election (Measure J) 78,136 60,910 33% 1992 general 171,566 151,156 15% 1993 32nd state Senate general 109,569 85,064 20% 1994 primary 105,348 79,218 20% 1994 general 180,228 155,500 20% 1995 35th state Senate primary 36,439 27,579 46%

Source: Orange County registrar of voters