Conroy Seen as Leader of Pack in 3rd District

Assemblyman Mickey Conroy is casting a long shadow over the race for supervisor in the 3rd District, even though the Republican from Orange is not currently an occupant of the Hall of Administration.

The 68-year-old Conroy, who has raised more money than any other candidate and has not been shy about augmenting his campaign mailers with Assembly correspondence paid for by taxpayers, is almost certain to be one of two finalists for the seat if the election goes to a runoff in November, most observers agree.

A few seasoned politicians are even willing to consider the possibility that Conroy could win a majority of the vote March 26, to take the seat outright despite facing seven opponents.

“The real question is: Can Mickey Conroy win it in the primary?” asked Bruce Nestande, who represented the district as both supervisor and assemblyman in the 1970s and ‘80s. “There is no question he has a shot at it. The next question is: If he doesn’t, who will be in second place?”

Conroy, who is organizing an active absentee ballot campaign, held two recent fund-raisers that added $70,000 to his campaign coffers, said consultant Mark Thompson. When officially tallied, they will bring Conroy’s total to about $140,000.

In response, Conroy’s opponents have made the former Marine flier the most frequent target of their campaign flak.

Todd Spitzer, a trustee of the Brea-Olinda Unified School District who has put $60,000 of his own money into his campaign, regularly derides Conroy.

“It absolutely scares me to think he is the leadership future for the county,” said Spitzer, who called Conroy’s championing of two Assembly measures that would have allowed paddling of graffiti vandals and students “embarrassing.”

“Even the GOP abandoned what he thought were the important issues,” Spitzer said. “He is just out of touch.”

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Conroy notes that he has the endorsement of a half dozen of his county legislative colleagues, including Assembly Speaker Curt Pringle. Yet he describes himself as someone who evaluates issues on their merits and is independent of outside influence by GOP power brokers.

“I am not a knee-jerk conservative,” he said.

The 3rd District lies in the northeast part of the county, encompassing all of La Habra and Brea, and sweeping south to Lake Forest and Mission Viejo.

It has about 270,000 registered voters--approximately 125,000 in the cities of Fullerton, Yorba Linda, La Habra and Brea; 37,000 in the central area that includes parts of Villa Park, Orange and Tustin; and 108,000 in the south, which is made up of Lake Forest, Mission Viejo and a substantial unincorporated area.

Supervisor Don Saltarelli, who was appointed to represent the district when Gaddi H. Vasquez resigned last year, is among the many veteran politicians who speculate that those demographics will reward a South County candidate--either Lake Forest City Council member Helen Wilson or Mission Viejo Council member Susan Withrow.

“I suspect a runoff between a candidate from the south and another from the central or north area,” he said.

A key factor in this equation is ballot Measure S, which is expected to generate a heavy turnout among South County voters, said Gary Hausdorfer, a consultant and former mayor of San Juan Capistrano. The measure would undo plans to convert the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station into a commercial airport.

South County demographics will favor Withrow, contends her consultant Dan Wooldridge, who described her as a popular figure in the district’s second-largest city. In Withrow’s most recent City Council election in November 1994, she won 12,171 votes, more than 36% of the ballots cast in a contest that included seven candidates.

Withrow, who has worked in urban planning and has a master’s degree in public administration, articulates a vision of the county in the year 2000 that includes a shrunken county government with unincorporated areas taken up by dominant cities. A part-time, expanded Board of Supervisors would oversee a strong government run by a powerful chief executive.

“Most people are happy with city government because it is closest to the people,” she said. “That is my model, a part-time council and strong staff.”

But Withrow has raised far less money than Conroy, Spitzer and Wilson. Wilson has collected $51,572, including $35,000 she has lent her campaign. (So far, neither Spitzer nor Wilson has dipped heavily into their personal money and some have questioned whether they will spend those funds.) Wilson has bemoaned the difficulty of raising money and the cost of reaching the sprawling district’s voters.

Wilson, who gave up a fledgling career in law enforcement, is a woman of diverse interests who helps run the family chiropractic business and rental property, has worked in the public and private sectors and is also active with nonprofit charitable groups.

“This is an ideal place to live and raise a family, and if I can help put the pieces of the puzzle together, I want to,” she said.

Wilson and Withrow are the only candidates to favor Measure T, which would establish a county charter.

Spitzer, who lives in Brea, is emphasizing his career as a deputy district attorney who specializes in welfare fraud, and his weekend vocation as a reserve police officer in Los Angeles. A trustee of the Brea-Olinda Unified School District, he is best known for helping to expose a widespread high school grade-changing scandal in his district.

Spitzer describes himself as the only candidate “who has expertise in exactly the day-to-day business of the county, through my law enforcement, prosecutorial expertise and my job fighting welfare fraud, which ties directly to the county’s delivery of social services.”

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Campaign spending reforms, which limit contributions by a family and/or business to $1,000 in each election cycle, have affected the fund-raising ability of those candidates who are trying to amass sizable war chests. Conroy, however, has been able to draw on a broad network of special interests, politicians and contacts he has developed through his years in the Legislature.

Hausdorfer said Spitzer, Withrow and Wilson must counter with old-fashioned legwork. He said he told them “to get out and to walk. I told them if you can convince enough people of your sincerity, then you have a chance to win.”

Four other candidates--activist Bruce Whitaker, lawyer William Dougherty, law clerk Ron Middlebrook and Maddox--are raising little or no money.

Whitaker, a Fullerton resident, is best known for his work with the Committees of Correspondence and his leading role last year in defeating Measure R, the half-cent sales tax increase designed to bail the county out of bankruptcy. Whitaker said he believes a lack of funding will not be a big factor for him because of his visibility during the sales tax debate and his “grass-roots support throughout the county.”

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“I call myself the candidate of the general interest and not the special interest,” he said.

Dougherty, a Villa Park resident who is also a former Marine flier, isn’t raising any money for much the same reason. “As soon as these people are elected, they are just going to be beholden to the people who are giving them money,” he said.

Dougherty is the only candidate opposing Measure S. He also believes the county unnecessarily declared bankruptcy when it was not insolvent.

Dougherty, who ran successfully for GOP Central Committee several times in the 1970s and was reelected in 1994, decries most of the county GOP leadership, contending “they don’t represent Republicans in Orange County. They represent the right religious wing of the Republican party. I am pro-business, but they want to go back to the days of the robber barons.”

Middlebrook, a Cowan Heights resident, works in the county law library. He has papered neighborhoods with signs and expects to draw on volunteers and canvassing efforts.

“With so many candidates running, all I have to do is come in second in the primary,” he said. “You don’t need thousands to get elected.”

Maddox of Santa Ana hopes to capitalize on his leadership at Rancho Santiago, where he played a key role in ending taxpayer-paid wining and dining of trustees and instituted rigorous audit procedures by accountants who report directly to the board.

Maddox said money and “slick mailers” will be less important than they were in the past, because the bankruptcy has fundamentally changed voters’ views of political candidates.

“We have never had a vote to replace supervisors who have taken us into bankruptcy before,” he said. “The people will be looking for someone who will fix the mess, not someone who is a good politician or campaigner.”

Saltarelli says whoever wins is in for a wild ride.

“Basically, the 3rd District is probably the most difficult district to manage because it is not only geographically diverse but philosophically diverse as well,” he said. “With its diversity, just about anything you are going to do is not going to please everyone.”

* THE ISSUES

How the eight candidates competing for the 3rd District seat feel about Measures S, T and other issues. B3