Chamber endorsement conflicts with Team mates
“The Team For Change” slate of three City Council candidates has been reduced to two.
Kathryn Morea has disassociated herself with her former running mates — David Cole and Bill Bauer — as a result of her being endorsed by the Santa Monica Chamber of Commerce.
When it became obvious that her continued association with Team for Change appeared to present problems for chamber supporters and her teammates, Morea voluntarily resigned from the slate this week.
When she was first endorsed two weeks ago by the chamber’s political action committee, Morea and her partners — who didn’t get the chamber’s support — didn’t think it would pose a problem.
“The chamber basically validated that we had something to say by endorsing one of our own,” Bauer said after the chamber endorsements. “It opens a huge amount of doors for her, but we pledged we would stay as the Team for Change.”
But then reality set in and logistics in the campaign presented all kinds of problems — from campaign finance rules to alleged objections by the chamber over campaign literature highlighting the Team for Change.
“It was a harder sell than we initially thought,” Morea said, adding that she and her teammates didn’t always agree on how money should be spent, particularly if it was coming directly to her from chamber supporters. “We talked about it a lot and the changes in the political landscape.”
Morea’s former running mates said there were indications that the chamber would not distribute Morea’s literature, and their support for her and their fundraising efforts would be hampered if the association with Bauer and Cole continued.
However, Morea’s literature distributed at a recent breakfast gathering for the chamber’s four candidates included the Team for Change. And at the event, Cole spoke on Morea’s behalf, encouraging people to vote for her.
“We absolutely did not say she couldn’t distribute that literature,” said Kathy Dodson, president and CEO of the chamber. “I think they are overreacting.”
Dodson also denies the Team for Change’s allegations that chamber leadership objected to numerous “Morea-Cole-Bauer” lawn signs posted around the city.
In fact, Morea knew this past weekend that her association with the team would be no more after she saw several lawn signs with her name cut out of them — a move made by her teammates.
“This wasn’t about loyalty, this is about logistics,” Morea said. “I wish them the best.”
Morea is now starting her campaign over — she has ordered new lawn signs, started a new Web site and is creating new literature.
“I am back peddling and going back to step one,” she said. “I am very much in fundraising mode.”
The Team for Change was formed with a vision that Santa Monica residents need elected leaders that aren’t obligated to special interest groups, as most of the leading candidates and incumbents are now, Bauer said.
“We’ve been saying from the beginning that we were free and independent thinkers and not in the pocket of big business, special interests or labor groups,” he said. “Morea’s endorsement presented conflicts with our ‘residents first’ message...”
Cole and Bauer have replaced most of their lawn signs and reprinted new literature. They also have changed their Web site to reflect Morea’s departure.
“Clearly, the chamber is handling its endorsements as a slate and Kathryn is free to run her campaign as part of that slate,” Cole said. “Bill and I wish her well. We will conduct our campaign as we always envisioned it as a trio, and we are not going away or laying down.
“The two of us will campaign right up until Nov. 2.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 29, 2004. Read the original PDF.