Bleak Political Landscape Awaits Governor

With their attention focused on attacking one another, Gov. Gray Davis and his Republican challenger, Bill Simon Jr., paid scant attention to laying out an agenda for running the state.

Now the winner -- whether Simon or the Democratic incumbent -- faces a bleak political landscape. Since both campaigned without much of a platform, the winner will have difficulty claiming a mandate, particularly given that so many of those who cast ballots Tuesday did so with reservations about the candidates.

The winner of the race begins by inheriting the state’s fiscal mess -- a looming budget shortfall that most experts predict will easily top $10 billion. He will soon be forced to choose between raising taxes or cutting billions of dollars in spending, much of it on popular programs.

Either candidate is certain to face fierce resistance in the Legislature, both from Republicans who refuse to raise taxes and Democrats who oppose program cuts.

But the battle over state money is only the most visible of the governor’s expected difficulties in working with a polarized Legislature that became even more so in Tuesday’s election.

Among the state’s biggest problems are substandard public schools, overcrowded freeways and uncertain water supplies. California also continues to feel the aftereffects of last year’s energy crisis.

In his campaign for reelection, Davis offered little in the way of an agenda he could use to advance in his second term. To win, he focused mainly on tearing down Simon with television ads depicting him as an untrustworthy and incompetent businessman.

In spots promoting himself, Davis looked backward, boasting of higher school test scores, more health coverage for children and other first-term accomplishments. It was only at the end of the race that Davis ran an ad promising to pursue more of the same in his second term.

“I don’t know that we’ve even had a clear message from him on what he wants to do for the next four years other than continuing the things he’s done so far,” said Larry N. Gerston, a political science professor at San Jose State.

Simon laid out vague plans for tax cuts, better schools and improvements in the road, water and power systems. But Simon would face a Legislature overwhelmingly controlled by Democrats deeply hostile to a candidate who campaigned as a “conservative Republican.”

For any new programs, the governor will be hamstrung by the state’s dismal fiscal outlook. This year, it was only after a two-month political stalemate that Davis and the Legislature closed a record budget gap of nearly $24 billion.

Next year could be worse. For now, the state’s revenue shortfall is projected at more than $10 billion, but analysts expect it to grow. A projected economic turnaround has not occurred. And the fiscal tricks used last year to balance the books -- spending postponement, fund transfers and the like -- now are just about exhausted, making a tax hike or big spending cuts all but inevitable.

Tuesday’s results were only likely to further hobble the governor as he confronts that issue. A ballot initiative to expand before- and after-school programs -- at a cost of up to $550 million a year -- was leading in early returns and could further constrain the state’s options for balancing the budget.

Over the course of the campaign, both candidates refused to say how they would resolve the crisis. Simon promised to shrink state government and pledged not to raise taxes. But he was careful not to rule out any hike in university tuition, park entrance fees or other charges that Californians pay.

With Davis, Gerston said the outcome was easy to predict: “He’s going to preside over the largest tax increase in recent memory. This has to be the worst-kept secret in the world.”

Conservatives in the Legislature, however, have no political reason to let the governor do that.

In several districts around the state, liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans defeated moderate opponents in the March primary, then went on to win the election Tuesday.

The deepening polarization of the Legislature is the result in part of a redistricting plan -- approved by representatives of both parties -- that created more solidly partisan districts, making it possible for more ideological candidates to prevail.

That leaves liberals prepared to fight to protect programs and conservatives ready to battle against tax hikes.

Democrats retain a solid majority in both houses of the Legislature, but the budget requires a two-thirds vote, so a handful of Republicans must consent to any tax hike.

“Republicans are not going to sit still for a tax increase,” said Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, a political science professor at USC. “They don’t have to.”

Pressure for a tax hike will come not just from liberal Democrats but also from organized labor, a major source of support for Democratic lawmakers and Davis. Art Pulaski, executive secretary treasurer of the California Labor Federation, said unions will seek a tax hike on the rich to avoid cuts elsewhere. “You can’t cut any more,” Pulaski said.

For Davis, a staunch centrist already unpopular among state lawmakers -- even within his own party -- the sharp divide within the Legislature portends trouble beyond the budget. Even his advisors acknowledge the coming months will test the governor.

“The minute he’s sworn in, he’s a lame-duck, term-limited incumbent, and it’s going to be to some degree more difficult to hold people in line,” said Garry South, the governor’s top political strategist.

For Davis, another potential thorn is the cadre of Democrats in other statewide elected offices, nearly all of whom are potential candidates for governor in 2006. Among them, according to early returns Tuesday, could be the newly elected insurance commissioner, John Garamendi, who ran for governor in 1994; state Atty Gen. Bill Lockyer, Treasurer Phil Angelides and Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante. Those officials were locked in tight races in early returns Tuesday.

To break apart from the pack, strategists said, any one of them could try to embarrass the governor the way state Controller Kathleen Connell did by criticizing him during her 2001 campaign for mayor of Los Angeles. Already, Bustamante has run television ads portraying himself as courageous for speaking out against a Davis administration software procurement scandal.

“They might all start ganging up against Davis, because talk is cheap,” GOP strategist Arnold Steinberg said.

At the same time, Davis would face more than just a changed political environment. He would enter the new term with an unfamiliar world view.

For decades, Davis has climbed the state political ladder, running for higher office time and again. Now, under term limits, Davis could not run again for governor, so his march through the state political ranks is complete.

He could run for president or seek to replace Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein if she decides not to seek reelection in 2006. Or he could govern with an eye toward his legacy rather than toward the next campaign.

“It does provide him with an opportunity -- if he really wanted to -- to become an elder statesman,” Steinberg said. “The question is what will be the last thing he wants to be remembered for.”