Candidates take final shots before elections
By Daily Press staff
Excerpts from Wednesday night’s “Squirm Night” forum for City Council candidates: ■ Challenger Patricia Hoff-man, who is endorsed by and sits on the steering committee of the powerful Santa Moni-cans for Renters’ Rights group, on SMRR weaknesses: “Wow, that’s a tough one... I think that where SMRR has been weakest has been on some of the development issues, actually. There’s been a lot of divide among the SMRR community as to how much development is the right amount, how much is too much and how much is too little. So I would’ve rather seen more of a consensus developed and a real focus on how we move forward on the issues of development by SMRR.” ■ Challenger Matt Dinolfo, a physician, on campaign donations he accepted from the CEO of Macerich Co., which has floated plans to build skyscraper apartments at Santa Monica Mall: “As it turns out, I care for a lot of people in this city, and that was the access I had... I care for a lot of people in the community, some of them are executives of companies in this community. They have a plan that they asked me to see.” ■ Challenger Bobby Shriver, on rumors that his campaign manager has threatened to quit twice: “I’ve been involved in many campaigns and, to the best of my knowledge, in every single one of them the campaign manager, the press secretary, the mail consultant and everybody else threatened to quit at least once — and in many cases people do quit, and they come back, and they quit again. It’s an intense world and people get intense feelings, and, generally speaking, they sleep on it and come back in the morning.” ■ Challenger David Cole, after being asked how residents could trust a candidate who doesn’t fully disclose and being asked to name the company he works for: “I’m not going to tell you. You know what, I will protect the residents of Santa Monica and I will protect the seniors and the mentally ill that I work with, to be honest with you. I don’t think it’s fair to have people come into where I work and (have them) asking me questions there, or calling me. A couple of weeks ago we had a (City Council candidate) forum at St. Anne’s (Catholic Church). About an hour before arriving there, or two hours, I held the hand of a senior citizen as she passed away. I didn’t have time for your call.” ■ City Councilman Ken Genser, who’s served on the council for 16 years, after being asked when the appropriate time to step down is: “I don’t support term limits. I don’t know why one would want to be served by any other person who has less experience, necessarily. I think if the person isn’t meeting one’s needs, one would fire their doctor, their lawyer, their accountant or whatever, but if they’re continuing to meet their needs I think you keep them and you draw on their experience... One of the things that (tells a candidate) one should end it, obviously, is when voters determine that that is the case.” ■ City Councilman Mike Feinstein, a Green Party leader, on the political fallout over a $10,000 campaign contribution he deposited into a personal bank account that the donor intended for the Green Party of Los Angeles County: “I took all of my records and I gave them to the Green Party state attorney, and the attorney looked at everything, and he went to the state Green Party and said, ‘You know what? Everything is tied up neat like a little bow and leave it alone and be done with it.’ I think at a certain point what is an internal political matter in a political party doesn’t belong out in the public sphere. And when people make the joke about the left having a firing squad in a circle, well that’s what kind of happened here. It’s unfortunate, but I at a certain point don’t really believe that internal Green Party business is anybody’s business, if it doesn’t have anything to do with illegality, and there’s nothing illegal about anything that I’ve done... Everybody who’s involved in the Green Party knows that the money that we raised here was used to have an office that we all used.” ■ Challenger Bill Bauer, a former Daily Press columnist, after being asked how he could work effectively with the same city officials he attacked in his columns: “Writing a political opinion column and working on City Council is two totally different things. I have a little bit of different set of standards than the news guys do. They have to go out and check stories and get both sides of an issue. If I have an opinion and I’m writing a column, then I can go out with my opinion... On the same hand, sitting on the City Council dais is a little different situation. Working together to benefit the community, to get things done, is very important and is a totally different thing.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on October 29, 2004. Read the original PDF.