Why The Scandal In the City Of Bell Will Help Jerry Brown And Steve Cooley
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Brown (left) and Cooley (right) have different political ideologies, but both have benefitted from scandal at the City of Bell.
Democratic candidate for Governor Jerry Brown and Republican candidate for Attorney General Steve Cooley have separately subpoenaed city records of employment, compensation and contracts in order to see if any laws were broken as some city councilmembers in Bell found ways to pay themselves more than $100,000 and a city manager, nearly $800,000.
Brown, the state's current attorney general, and Cooley, who serves as L.A. County's district attorney, have capitalized on the attention placed on Bell to make their faces more recognizable as they head into the the final three full months before the election.
The most recent data from the Field Poll shows Cooley 3 percent ahead of his competitor, San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris, a Democrat. About three in 10 likely voters remain undecided about who to cast their vote for, and seven out of 10 likely voters have not yet formed an opinion about either Attorney General candidate. Brown is in a statistical tie with Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman.
The lavish incomes of some of Bell's elected officials have afforded Cooley and Brown an opportunity to put their faces in front of television cameras. Their seizure of the gift means a team of lawyers in each of their offices is likely under pressure to produce a criminal complaint involving Bell to sustain the media focus before the election.
An editorial in the Orange County Register on July 29 quoted a UC Irvine law professor saying that because every maneuver by Bell's council was legal, Brown's investigation is unlikely to uncover wrongdoing. Cooley's office, which has apparently known since March that Bell's leaders were receiving exorbitant pay for little work, has shifted his office's focus to alleged voter fraud and conflicts of interest on the part of the elected officials.
Ann Crigler, chair of USC's political science department, said that based on their official duties, it makes sense for Brown and Cooley to put their might into the Bell case.
“If people are in a position of power, they feel they should do something to fix the situation,” she said.
It's too cynical, Crigler said, to believe that Brown and Cooley's motivations are chiefly political.
“At least some people should have the belief that they are really trying to get a remedy,” she said.
Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, a senior fellow at the USC School of Policy, Planning, and Development and a former KNBC political analyst, agreed that the official capacities of Cooley and Brown bring legitimacy to the situation.
“There are times when good government is good politics, and based on their day jobs, they would be remiss if they didn't do these investigations,” she said. “You can never take politics out of policy.”
Whatever the justification for their probes, Crigler said that the scandal will call more attention to candidates.
“People feel outraged about the activities in Bell, and the realization that people outside of Bell will have to pay for these pensions brings people from all over California into this,” Crigler said.
Jeffe said Brown is benefitting from free access to media coverage. As Whitman exceeds $100 million in campaign spending, much of it expended for advertisements, Bell allows Brown to position himself in news coverage that voters view less skeptically than paid media.
However, Crigler cautioned that many more factors will come into play in an election season that is still in its infancy as the sunny skies of summer vacation remain in the air.
“There will be some positive reverberations [for Brown and Cooley], but they will be hard to distinguish from other things that come up between now and the election,” Crigler said.
Cooley's battle against a Democrat in a Democratically-leaning state will have to especially rely on advertising to draw undecided voters his way.
Crigler said people rely on shortcuts when deciding who to vote for in races that are not as high-profile as the gubernatorial race.
After noting the candidates' parties and endorsements, voters will rely on voter guides, advertisements and direct mailers to form a decision. It takes, in other words, a message and money.
Jeffe said voters tend to lean toward more moderate to conservative candidates when selecting politicians to fill law enforcement posts, but that doesn't mean that Harris should counted out.
Harris has touted programs she launched in San Francisco, such as those involving environmental justice, online identification theft and youth rehabilitation. She supports gay marriage and is personally against capital punishment. Her efforts have focused on enforcing gun purchase restrictions and increasing prosecution of gang members, domestic violence cases and sex crimes.
Cooley, who was a reserve police officer for six years, has focused on cases of political corruption and wrongdoing within the criminal justice system as well as the Catholic Church. He supports the death penalty and does not support medical marijuana dispensaries. He's received much attention from the highly-publicized Roman Polanski case and other legal proceedings involving celebrities.
As of May 22, Harris had nearly three times as much cash on hand as Cooley. She spent more than $30,000 to be included on slate mailings with several other candidates ahead of the June primary. With about $600,000 in the bank, she can be expected to pump out more fliers in the coming months.
Brown and Cooley will also need to spend money to make their names more widely recognized, but Bell has aided that pursuit at little cost.
“This kind of corruption has been going on for quite some time in southeast Los Angeles, it's a matter of luck and timing that this news broke when it could help these two candidates,” Jeffe said. “And politics is a matter of luck and timing.”
To reach staff reporter Paresh Dave, click here.
Follow Paresh on Twitter: @peard33.
