Long-Suffering Voters

Assemblyman Tony Cardenas and Wendy Greuel, an entertainment executive and former aide to Tom Bradley, somehow managed to voice delight about being cast Tuesday into a surely exhausting three-month runoff to represent the Los Angeles City Council’s 2nd District. That’s definitely political speech at its hardest to swallow.

A third candidate, Van Nuys businessman James Cordaro, lacked a high profile but still drew almost 10% of the vote, preventing either of his rivals from getting the 50% plus one needed to win the seat vacated by longtime Councilman Joel Wachs.

Final pre-runoff campaign contributions and expenditures won’t be reported until next month, but reports so far show that Cardenas and Greuel, who is endorsed by The Times, together spent just under $800,000. That is not a record--the recent 4th Council District election set that--but it’s still $40 per vote cast.

Fewer than 19% of the 106,755 registered voters in the east San Fernando Valley district voted Tuesday, according to unofficial returns. That’s disappointing even for a special election, and especially so with all the red, white and blue waving from porches and cars these past three months. If only we Americans could value the vote as much as we have embraced the flag.

The runoff will be held with the regular March 5 state and local primary election. The long campaign means a greater temptation to go negative and spend lots of money doing so.

Cardenas and Greuel both participated in the city’s matching funds program by agreeing to voluntary spending limits. The $330,000 spending cap was lifted, however, before Tuesday’s election when Cardenas backers spent about $70,000 campaigning independently on his behalf. Independent spending is the bane of campaign finance reform; no city or state has found a way to legally contain it.

The spending cap for runoff elections is $275,000. That’s plenty, considering how weary residents get of campaign fliers stuffing their mailboxes and how wary they are of a hard-fought race turning ever more negative. But that cap too could be busted if independent spending gets out of hand.

Recently elected City Council member Jan Perry has said that candidates who can’t get elected for less than $300,000 shouldn’t be allowed to serve because they obviously can’t spend money efficiently. It would be refreshing if candidates took this wisdom to heart. Or better yet, if voters did.