Firms Warned They Are ‘Easy Targets’ for Initiatives

A Los Angeles campaign consultant told South Bay business leaders Thursday that local industry is vulnerable to the increasing use of the initiative process by citizens concerned about pollution, growth and traffic issues.

“There are some major interests at risk here,” political consultant George Young said at the annual meeting of the South Bay Chambers of Commerce in Torrance.

‘In Love’ With Process

“In California, we are kind of in love with the initiative process,” Young said. In recent years, he noted, the state’s voters have passed ballot measures aimed at controlling toxic chemicals, increasing tobacco taxes and regulating insurance companies.

Young said voters have a lot of compassion for people but do not have the same compassion for profit-making businesses and industry. “They are easy targets to pick on,” he said.

A veteran of successful campaigns to defeat several measures that would have curbed commercial and office development in El Segundo, Young suggested that business leaders must start to educate voters long before the heat of a political campaign.

“A dollar spent in advance of a political crisis . . . is worth at least $10 during the campaign,” Young said. “A lot of people vote for things out of ignorance.”

Listening intently to Young’s advice was Wyman D. Robb, manager of the Mobil Oil’s Torrance refinery, which is the subject of an initiative campaign.

“I share his concerns about the direction the initiative process is taking,” Robb said in an interview. “It is certainly going to have bigger and bigger impacts on industry. We currently are a prime example.”

After conducting a direct-mail campaign, Torrance City Councilman Dan Walker last week submitted nearly 10,000 signatures on petitions to force Mobil to stop using toxic hydrofluoric acid in its refining process.

The measure is expected to qualify for the March, 1990, municipal ballot in Torrance after county election officials check the validity of the signatures.

Young said business is vulnerable because it is so easy to qualify an initiative for the ballot in a small community. Usually, the signatures of only 10% of registered voters are required.

In affluent communities where voters are concerned about quality-of-life issues, Young said, the loss of jobs that can result from an anti-business initiative is “a relatively weak card” to play in campaigning against a ballot measure.

He said voters need to be told about the ripple effect that an industrial payroll has on a local economy. “Do some advance work on this before you get confronted with a campaign crisis type of situation,” Young told the audience.

Careful Campaign

But he cautioned that a campaign against a ballot measure “must be done skillfully so it doesn’t look self-serving.”

Although he did not mention the anti-Mobil initiative during his prepared remarks, Young said later: “What any business in Mobil’s position has to do is get the facts out as soon as possible in a believable way.”

Robb said last week that Mobil will be intensifying its efforts to communicate with Torrance residents through mailings and meetings. He agreed with Young that the jobs argument “is not a very strong card for industry.”

After the chamber meeting, Robb declined to offer details about Mobil’s efforts to defeat the initiative. “We’re still watching and assessing the situation as it develops,” he said. “There is a lot that is likely to happen between now and March, 1990.”