Pringle, Deputies Push Rival Tobacco Cash Measure

Former Assembly Speaker Curt Pringle and the Orange County Deputy Sheriffs Assn. have joined forces to back a proposed ballot measure that would offer an alternative spending formula for the county’s share of the national tobacco settlement, with half the money going to retire bankruptcy bonds.

Should it make the November ballot, it would compete with a measure already qualified by a coalition of community and medical groups.

The new plan would spend 25% of the funds on health care, 25% on jail expansion and use 50% to retire county bankruptcy debt. The health care alliance’s ballot measure would allocate 80% of the funds for health care and 20% for law enforcement.

The county anticipates receiving about $30 million a year from the settlement for the next 25 years. Because it is too late for the Pringle plan to qualify through the signature process, it would have to be placed on the ballot by a majority of the Board of Supervisors.

Pringle, who runs a government affairs consulting business in the county, said he has been talking “with a couple of supervisors” about the plan. Three of them--Chairman Chuck Smith, Cynthia P. Coad and Jim Silva--may be sympathetic to the newest plan because they have opposed the health coalition’s measure, at one point even rejecting a compromise that would have allotted to health programs 60% of the $765 million the county expects to receive over the 25 years. The remaining 40% would have been split between jail expansion and debt reduction.

“I would be amenable to putting something on the ballot if I thought it was in the best interests of county to do so,” said Smith. “I can’t say until I have studied it.”

Smith, who had objected to the health coalition’s plan because it restricts the spending preferences of future supervisors, said he has the same problem with Pringle’s plan.

“That troubles me,” he said, noting that county counsel had described such provisions as unconstitutional.

None of the other supervisors could be reached for comment late Friday. Sheriff Mike Carona, who had supported the 60% compromise the supervisors rejected, also could not be reached.

The health care alliance called the plan unacceptable.

“Obviously, that is not something we can support,” said Michele Revelle, spokeswoman for the health groups.

The health alliance has more than $200,000 in its campaign chest, according to its most recent report, and it expects to raise more, she said. It is backed by a majority of the county’s legislators as well as all the hospitals in the county, the Orange County Medical Assn. and the Coalition of Orange County Community Clinics.

The plan outlined by Pringle would allot 50% of the county’s annual tobacco payment--about $15 million--to retire bankruptcy recovery bonds. It would take about 15 years to pay off the $240-million obligation, he said. At that point, the remaining tobacco payments would be split between jail costs and health care, bringing each to the 50% level.

Pringle said his actions are unconnected with his consulting business and he is “acting as a citizen trying to reach out to others and see if they have an interest in bringing about greater fiscal responsibility to the county with these funds.”