Incumbents Look ‘Tough to Beat’ in W. Hollywood

More than 14 months ago, West Hollywood chose its first City Council in a tumultuous, free-spending election campaign that pitted 40 politically inexperienced candidates against each other. Five emerged as winners.

This April, three of those winners are up for reelection in a race expected to test voters’ approval of the council’s controversial first year and its positions on rent control, civil rights and development.

But West Hollywood’s political landscape has shifted markedly since the November, 1984, free-for-all. This time around, there will be fewer candidates, less campaign money and new power blocs to contend with.

The most significant change, though, is the simple fact that the three candidates facing reelection--Mayor John Heilman and council members Helen Albert and Stephen Schulte--have had 18 months in office to solidify their political base, meet with voters and repay old campaign debts.

‘Tough to Beat’

“The incumbents are going to be tough to beat,” Councilman Alan Viterbi said. “When you think about it, the council has been the only political game in town since the last election. We’ve done some controversial things, but we’re also the only ones who have been out there talking to people and dealing with issues every day.”

Heilman, Albert and Schulte had the three lowest vote totals of the five winning council members in 1984. In order to stagger elections in newly incorporated cities, state election laws mandate that the three lowest vote-getters seek reelection after 18 months. The winners of those elections will then serve two-year terms.

Council members Viterbi and Valerie Terrigno, who won the two highest totals, do not face reelection for another two years.

The three incumbents have their work cut out for them. Besides facing as many as 12 potential challengers (the election filing period opened Jan. 9 and will close Jan. 30), the incumbents may be opposed by a new coalition of self-styled moderates and conservatives who plan to sponsor their own slate of candidates.

Heilman and Albert have been portrayed by political observers as the most formidable candidates because of their unwavering support from the Coalition for Economic Survival, a tenants rights and rent control advocacy group that emerged from the 1984 election as the most powerful political bloc in the city.

Dependable Votes

Larry Gross, the coalition’s coordinator, said that Heilman and Albert can depend on the votes of at least 2,000 tenants. “We’re even stronger than we were in the last election,” he said. “Our membership is up and many of our members are more actively involved now than they were then.”

In the 1984 race, Heilman, Albert and Douglas Routh, a third coalition-backed candidate who came in sixth just behind Schulte, each received more than 3,000 votes. “It’s pretty obvious that anyone who has CES support starts off with a pretty sizable cushion of votes,” said Parke Skelton, who is campaign manager for both Heilman and Albert.

Heilman said he and Albert will stress affordable housing and urge tenants to retain a strong rent control law by voting for the coalition’s slate. The two council members are also in good financial shape, having eliminated their 1984 campaign debts.

“Helen and I will be depending on small contributors,” said Heilman. “We’re aiming at raising (a total of) $45,000 to cover all of our expenses.

Schulte hopes to raise a similar amount by himself. Having spent more than $65,000 on his 1984 race--and still burdened by a campaign debt of $12,000--he insists he will have little trouble raising about $45,000. He has scheduled a $175-a-plate fund-raising dinner next week when he hopes to bring in at least $30,000.

But Schulte is having more difficulty persuading the Coalition for Economic Survival’s steering committee to install him as the third member of its campaign slate.

Some members of the coalition have become disillusioned with council members Viterbi and Terrigno, who were members of the 1984 slate. And there are fears among some coalition members that backing Schulte now could be cause for regret later.

Feeling of ‘Betrayal’

“The feeling is that Alan and Valerie betrayed us on key rent control and development votes,” said one steering committee member, who declined to be identified. Some steering committee members criticized Schulte for not supporting the coalition’s agenda and important council votes over the past year. Schulte has defended himself as an independent council member who tries to appeal to a broad-based constituency.

Heilman and Schulte also have reportedly clashed with each other. And coalition members say they were dissatisfied with some of Schulte’s choices for city committees. “He went with a few too many big-money choices,” said another coalition source.

Schulte said he considers the coalition endorsement “important,” but insisted he could win “with it or without it.”

Schulte has also been vexed by a campaign problem of a different sort. For the past two months, local politicians and Schulte allies have been receiving copies of nude photographs--sent anonymously--for which Schulte posed more than a decade ago. The pictures appeared in adult-oriented magazines and Schulte was paid for them.

In the past, Schulte has said he posed for the photographs during a period when he was out of work. He acknowledged them early in 1984, but they were not a major campaign issue later that year.

“It’s something I thought I had already dealt with,” Schulte said. “Obviously, it’s from someone disgruntled with me politically who can’t get at me any other way. I intend to ignore it.”

Straw Poll

One of Schulte’s potential challengers, Mark Werksman, a 26-year-old graduate of Yale University and the USC Law Center, recently called attention to the photographs. He reportedly asked passers-by about them during a recent straw poll at a shopping center.

Werksman, who said he plans to run but has not filed, said he only mentioned the photographs as “one of a wide range of subjects. Most people know about the photos. I didn’t dig them up. I don’t intend to use them as an issue. I’m not running just against Steve Schulte and I don’t want to be perceived as a hit man.”

Werksman is one of 12 potential challengers who have taken out filing papers, but have yet to return them. Three potential challengers who ran in the 1984 race and may run this April are Ron Stone, Bernard (Bud) Siegel and Ruth Williams.

Stone, who founded the incorporation movement, won 1,700 votes in the 1984 race and finished 14th among 40 candidates. He has asked the Coalition for Economic Survival to include him on its slate and was scheduled to talk to the group’s steering committee this week. “I think my views are closer to CES than anyone else’s in the race,” he said.

Siegel, who finished seventh in 1984, held a fund-raiser last week in an effort to wipe out a campaign debt of more than $10,000. “I didn’t do as well as I’d hoped,” he said, adding, “I’ll run if I can be certain I won’t incur any more debt.”

A third candidate expected to run this April is Williams, a community activist who finished 19th in the 1984 campaign. Williams has worked on improving her name recognition in West Hollywood by winning an appointment to on the city’s Rent Stabilization Commission and organizing a Neighborhood Watch organization on the city’s east side.

Filing Papers

Others who have taken out campaign papers include Werksman, real estate broker Tom Larkin, who has placed campaign ads in two West Hollywood newspapers, and activists Bob Williams, Henry Sanborn, Alan R. Mulquinn, Ronald Norman, Bruce Shaw, Henry Sanborn and Stephen Michael.

Besides lacking name recognition, most of those challengers may also have trouble finding adequate campaign financing.

“I think financing will be hard to come by for any challenger,” said Ronald S. Kates, an influential commercial real estate broker who funded more than half a dozen candidates in 1984. “A lot of it may have to deal with stability. There are a lot of people in the business community who are concerned about having a new set of faces to deal with after the election.”

Some of the challengers may also be looking ahead to the next municipal election, which could come as early as this fall. Although Viterbi and Terrigno are not up for reelection until 1988, Terrigno faces a trial in March on federal embezzlement charges.

If she is convicted and forced to resign, some challengers say, a special election would probably be called this fall. Some say that even if they lost the April contest, they would gain recognition for that race.

New Coalition

Some challengers may also benefit from a newly organized coalition of moderates and conservatives who plan to interview candidates for an independent slate.

The coalition, West Hollywood for a Good Government, includes business leaders such as West Hollywood Chamber of Commerce President Tony Melia, discontented political activists Steven Weltman and Don Genhart and landlord organizer Grafton Tanquary.

“It (the formation of the coalition) is an attempt to get the City Council to be more in tune with the merchants who provide most of the city’s revenues,” said Melia. “And frankly, there’s a perception that the only group listened to in this city is CES. We think they’re a one-trick pony and other voices need to be heard.”

But Tanquary’s presence in the group poses a risk for any candidates who seek its endorsement. Coalition for Economic Survival coordinator Larry Gross said he perceives West Hollywood for a Good Government as an organization determined to defeat Heilman and Albert and repeal the rent control law passed last year in favor of a more moderate ordinance.

“These are the same people who fought rent control the last time,” Gross said. “They may have a little broader base this time, but their message is more or less the same. They are landlords and conservatives, and we’ll portray them for what they are.”