Candidates’ Ethics Meeting Breaks Up in Discord

A meeting among representatives of several Democratic candidates for state insurance commissioner to discuss an “ethics code” for the race broke up in disharmony Wednesday over issues of occupational designations on the ballot and whether to ban contributions from special-interest groups.

Walter Zelman, who organized the meeting and proposed a 12-part ethics code, accused candidates Bill Press, Conway Collis and Ray Bourhis of trying to scuttle his proposal. He said they would not agree to forgo contributions from political action committees and some trial lawyers’ groups.

Press, Collis and Bourhis, on the other hand, charged that Zelman’s representatives had walked out of the meeting in a Beverly Hills hotel when their representatives questioned the ethics of Zelman using “director, Common Cause” under his name as an occupational designation on the June primary ballot. They pointed out that Zelman resigned from that position months ago to become a candidate and thus no longer is director of Common Cause.

The Press, Collis and Bourhis campaigns also questioned the meaningfulness of Zelman’s proposal for a ban on contributions from “trial lawyer associations, officeholders or members of boards of those organizations and law firms that are primarily engaged in auto-related personal injury litigation.”

They pointed out that this leaves the door open for contributions from hundreds of individual trial attorneys, and Press noted that Zelman has already had a friend in the legal profession solicit such attorneys for contributions.

Zelman responded that the California secretary of state’s office says that his occupational designation on the ballot is legal, and he said he sees an important distinction between accepting money from individual personal injury attorneys and their law firms or associations.

Not represented at the meeting was state Sen. John Garamendi, who has said he will not participate in campaign activities until he formally announces his candidacy next week.

Zelman said he will adhere to his proposed ethics code even if the other candidates do not. Bourhis, Press and Collis said they will develop their own ethics code and invite Zelman to sign it.