Roth Enters Campaign for County Supervisor

Backed by endorsements and the encouraging results of a poll he commissioned, Anaheim Mayor Don Roth on Friday formally declared his candidacy for the county supervisor’s seat being vacated next year by Ralph B. Clark.

Roth became the second official candidate for the 4th District seat that includes Anaheim, Buena Park, La Palma and most of Orange. Jim Beam, the mayor of Orange, announced his candidacy Aug. 26, three days after Clark said he would not run for reelection.

“I certainly am going to run the most vigorous campaign for supervisor that’s ever been run in the county,” Roth said, estimating the cost of the campaign will be between $200,000 and $300,000.

No Party Politics

Roth, 64, and Beam, 51, are both Republicans, but Roth said he would not inject party politics into the nonpartisan Board of Supervisors. Clark is the only Democrat on the five-member board.

Roth said the honorary chairman of his campaign committee will be Assemblyman Ross Johnson (R-La Habra), who accompanied him to the press conference announcing the candidacy. The mayor also said he had endorsements from the mayors of Buena Park and La Palma.

Additionally, Lois Lundberg, former county Republican Party chairman, will handle fund raising, Roth said.

Roth said he was encouraged by a telephone poll he paid for earlier this month by a Long Beach firm, which sampled 250 people in the supervisorial district. The poll showed Roth favored by 23.6% of the sample to 9.7% for Beam, he said, and gave Roth a name-recognition rating of 30% compared to 18% for Beam.

The Anaheim mayor, who has been known to mix up his words in the past, did so again Friday.

Last year, Roth said the Soviet Union was boycotting the Olympic Games because of concern about “deflectors” when he meant “defectors.” At the press conference Friday, he said his district had borne the “blunt,” instead of “brunt,” of attention by county officials over possible sites for a new jail and dump.

Savvy Political Operator

Roth said the political consultant for his campaign, Harvey Englander, was “a very politically naive individual who knows what’s going on.” In fact, politicians consider Englander the opposite of naive: a savvy operator in the political world.

Englander said later that Roth’s verbal slips did not bother him.

Roth is “about as much a person-next-door as anyone is,” Englander said. “He’s not a professional politician. If he at times makes some grammar errors, I think that’s pretty inconsequential. I’m not that concerned about it.”

The consultant said Roth spoke the way the average person does. “I think almost everybody we know outside your business and maybe mine talks that way,” Englander said.

Roth said he was developing position papers on ways of improving transportation in the county, methods of handling toxic wastes, studying where to put a new county jail and new dump sites, and his opposition to offshore oil drilling because of its harm to air quality.

Same Issues Covered

Beam said at his August press conference that he was developing position papers on most of those same issues.

Roth was appointed to the Anaheim City Council in 1971 to fill the seat vacated when Clark, then mayor of Anaheim, moved on to the Board of Supervisors. After serving a year, Roth ran for election in 1972, won and was reelected in 1976 and 1980.

He said his experience as chairman of the South Coast Air Quality Management District’s executive board, chairman of a county sanitation district and former chairman of the Santa Ana River Flood Protection Agency “has given me a great deal of insight into the problems and opportunities facing the Board of Supervisors.”

Clark, who has not endorsed anyone in the race yet, said he decided not to run because of his age (he is 68), his health and questions about his involvement with former Anaheim fireworks manufacturer W. Patrick Moriarty.

Clark is one of six political figures who received prostitutes from Moriarty, according to former Moriarty associates, including persons who said they were present. Clark has denied the allegation.

Moriarty pleaded guilty in March to seven counts of mail fraud stemming from bribery and illegal campaign contributions. He is awaiting sentencing.