Race for county supervisor puts board majority in play

The race between a political newcomer and a veteran city councilwoman for Sonoma County's 4th District supervisor seat is far more than a contest to determine who will replace Supervisor Mike McGuire representing the north county.

At the core of the contest between James Gore, a former Obama administration official, and Deb Fudge, a longtime Windsor Town councilwoman, is a political fight to determine the majority on the Board of Supervisors, by both ideology and gender. It will affect how the county will act on a host of high-profile issues tied to land use, economic development, investment in infrastructure — including crumbling roads — environmental protection and county spending on employee pay and benefits.

(For a regularly updated database of campaign contributions to candidates and independent groups in the 4th District race, click here.)

Both candidates have sought to stake out broad platforms, shake off political labels and tout their appeal to a wide spectrum of voters.

But much of their financial support has come from the county's dueling political camps, with business, real estate and farm groups falling in behind Gore and environmental interests, many labor groups and the county's Democratic Party endorsing Fudge.

That divide, plus campaign spending in the race, which could approach $1 million by Nov. 4 and shatter a county record set in 2012, reflects the high stakes, with the outcome on Election Day set to decide who controls the county's agenda for years to come.

'This really is a pivotal race,' said David McCuan, a Sonoma State University political science professor. With many of the region's legislative races all but locked down by front-runner candidates, McCuan called the Fudge-Gore contest 'the only really big race,' on the county ballot.

'In some ways it's the only suspenseful race — the only one with drama, combined with a bit of Kabuki theater,' he said.

If Fudge wins, it would mark the first time in county history that three women constitute the majority on the five-member board. It would also be three women who are politically aligned, giving sway to the more liberal voting bloc now represented mostly by Supervisors Shirlee Zane and Susan Gorin, who have both endorsed Fudge.

A win by Gore could solidify the more conservative bloc formed by David Rabbitt and Efren Carrillo. Rabbitt, the board chairman, has endorsed Gore, while Carrillo has not made a public endorsement.

In split votes on the current board, McGuire, who is running for state Senate, has sided with both blocs. He has not endorsed in the race.

Supervisors and candidates often bristle at suggestions that such clearly defined camps exist on the board. Most often, the county body acts unanimously, they note.

Still, Zane and Fudge, especially, are close political allies, and photos circulating on social media recently have shown them together at a number of local events. Zane posted a photo Oct. 5 on her Facebook page that shows her, Fudge and Gorin together at a North Bay Organizing Project event. Above the photo she wrote: 'the new majority on the Board of Supervisors!?'

But Zane last week dismissed any concerns that the three women would form a voting bloc, saying it 'sounds like sexism to me.'

'Would you be asking the same question if Gore were elected — (that) it's three men politically aligned?' she asked.

Even with gender taken out of the equation, Zane said, 'I would have just as much concern if Gore gets elected — you have three guys that are politically aligned.'

The contest between Fudge and Gore was unlikely until late last year, when McGuire announced his run for the Senate seat held by Noreen Evans, D-Santa Rosa, who is stepping down at the end of this year.

Fudge, 58, a retired PG&E senior program manager, five-time Windsor mayor and member of the board overseeing the planned Sonoma-Marin commuter train, formally announced her run for the 4th District seat in mid-November, just a few weeks after McGuire's announcement. She is making her third bid for the same seat and the win that narrowly eluded her in 2006. McGuire handily beat her in the race for the open seat four years ago.

Gore, 36, was a political unknown when he entered the race two weeks after Fudge, in early December. But the Sonoma County native and former White House appointee made a strong showing in the June primary, emerging from the field of five candidates to secure nearly 35 percent of the vote. Fudge earned nearly 37 percent.

Their runoff has been closely fought, with Fudge and Gore ramping up door-to-door canvassing through the summer and squaring off recently in a series of candidate forums.

Fudge said the biggest difference between her and Gore is her long tenure in public service and proven track record, one she said voters 'know they can count on.'

' I'm very responsive to the community,' she said. 'I'm a known quantity.'

Gore portrays himself as the more independent candidate.

'I'm going to bring people together,' he said. 'I'm not beholden to anybody and I'm not connected to the politics of the past.'

Gore has led in campaign fundraising and spending, while independent expenditure committees have jumped in on both sides with big money to spend in the final weeks of the race.

The first salvo, fired about month ago by a committee tied to labor and environmental groups supporting Fudge, raised hard-hitting questions about Gore's professional background, including his past work for a Washington, D.C., lobbying and consulting firm.

Yet while the standoff between their political backers is familiar, both candidates have rolled out endorsements and made statements they hope could shake up the political landscape.

Fudge has earned endorsements from both of the county's elected law enforcement officials — Sheriff Steve Freitas and District Attorney Jill Ravitch — a rare achievement in recent years.

Gore, meanwhile, has sought and secured endorsements from members making up the majority of all three city councils in the 4th District — Healdsburg, Cloverdale and Windsor, where Fudge is a current councilwoman.

The 4th District extends from northern Santa Rosa to the Mendocino County line, also taking in the unincorporated Larkfield-Wikiup area and Geyserville. It encompasses much of the upper Russian River watershed, including Alexander and Dry Creek valleys, two of the county's premium wine grape regions. Historically, it tends to be more conservative, electing supervisors such as Republicans Nick Esposti and Paul Kelley, McGuire's predecessor.

But both Fudge and Gore have said their priorities in office would span the partisan divide that has long separated their most powerful backers.

'I'm not a winery lackey for events or for winery expansions. I'm not a business person, even though some of those people are supporting me,' Gore said last week, answering a question about how he would handle proliferating events at wineries that can irk rural neighbors. 'I am a person who is looking to represent everybody. But it comes down to community and citizen first, always.'

Fudge, for her part, has fought back against suggestions by her rival and critics that she is anti-business.

Healdsburg Councilman Gary Plass, a Gore supporter, worries that if Fudge is elected and forms a majority with Zane and Gorin, an environmental agenda will trump other considerations.

'If you look at the rest of the dais, I'm afraid farmers and business people might have to pack up and move,' he said of the prospect of a Fudge victory. 'I'm not convinced she is as business friendly as she wants people to believe.'

Fudge said her critics overlook her record of votes in favor of economic development. She also dismissed suggestions that she would form an unmovable voting bloc with Zane and Gorin. 'We have our differences,' she said, adding that she expects to work with all board members.

'I have many business people endorsing me. My support is not narrow at all. It's more broad than it's ever been,' Fudge said. 'When you've built a town with a team and you're building a train, you can't be more business-friendly than that.'

Fudge has highlighted her role in creating the Windsor Town Green and championing the SMART commuter train line that is being built to serve the North Bay.

She has close to two decades in public service, including two years as a Windsor planning commissioner, and she has been elected five times to the Windsor Town Council. She notes her rival has never held an elected position and says his political identity is a mystery.

'James is painting himself as more conservative,' Fudge said. 'People think he's a Republican when he goes to doors.'

Gore, like Fudge, is a registered Democrat.

He moved back to Sonoma County in 2013 after more than 15 years away, during which time he went to college, worked in the Peace Corps, and then in Washington, D.C.

His work before 2010, when he joined the Obama administration — he eventually served two years as an assistant chief of the Department of Agriculture's Natural Resources Conservation Service — has drawn the most scrutiny from his opponents.

They have noted that in the preceding four years, starting in 2006, he worked for a Washington-based management and consulting firm and was registered as a lobbyist for a half-dozen interests, including debt collectors and a chemical company. The claims were advanced in political mailers and a website called 'James Gore's Inconvenient Truth,' paid for by an independent expenditure campaign with ties to labor and environmental groups that are supporting Fudge.

But Gore said he was mistakenly registered as a lobbyist and never worked as one. His former employer, JBC International, also said they corrected the error, and a U.S. Senate disclosure database shows amendments were made to essentially remove him as a lobbyist for all companies, other than the Wine Institute.

Gore said he never lobbied for the Wine Institute, either, but worked on expanding wine exports to emerging markets in Third World countries.

'The White House would not have appointed me if I was a lobbyist,' Gore said, noting the Obama administration's ban on lobbyists serving in the government, with few exceptions.

'There was an executive order against it,' Gore said. 'They did not provide me an exception.'

The long period that Gore spent living outside of Sonoma County and his not having voted here until this year, are other potential liabilities, said Petaluma political consultant Brian Sobel.

Gore has positives that may balance that out for some people, Sobel said. '(He's) young, he's very bright, he's articulate and he is somebody who has had experience in Washington, D.C.'

But former Healdsburg Mayor Pete Foppiano said Gore's lack of a track record 'raises legitimate questions. People don't know what a candidate's going to do.'

Foppiano, who placed fourth in the June primary, has endorsed Fudge. The two other primary contenders — Ken Churchill and Keith Rhinehart — have not made public endorsements.

'She (Fudge) has had a lot of local experience,' Foppiano said. 'She's been involved in transportation, water issues, helping rebuild Windsor. She's been on a lot of boards and commissions. She's qualified to hit the ground running. She doesn't have to come up to speed, because she is up to speed.'

Sobel said Fudge's experience and her track record could be an advantage.

'She's been holding public office in this region for a long time,' he said. 'On the local level, she's a known quantity.'

A recent mailer from Fudge's campaign highlighted her 10 years of service on the board of the Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit agency, including a stint as chairwoman, 'leading the way to make SMART a reality.' She said the commuter train will cut traffic, reduce pollution and create thousands of jobs.

But Gore supporters, including Plass, the Healdsburg councilman, noted that the planned commuter train has had fiscal problems from the start, resulting in a curtailed initial route that won't run as far north as voters were promised when they approved a sales tax in 2008 to build the service.

'It's not her strongest hour,' Plass said. 'People are paying taxes for a train they won't see for a long time.'

Fudge said that since the recession changed tax funding projections for SMART, she has been hard at work to add stations and track so that it will run all the way to Cloverdale and not just stop north of Santa Rosa, near Airport Boulevard.

Over weeks of campaigning, the two candidates have offered both rough impressions and some clear answers of where they might stand on a number of high-profile county issues.

Both candidates favor asking voters to approve a quarter-cent sales tax to address the county's estimated $268 million backlog in road maintenance, an issue that has stirred significant public protest in recent years. Gore has expressed a willingness to spend more general fund money on roads than Fudge, who has cautioned that such decisions would need to be balanced against other general fund programs, including public safety.

Asked by the Sonoma County Taxpayers Association how they would spend an extra $25 million a year from the general fund if it were to become available, Fudge said she would spend $15 million of it on roads and related infrastructure. Gore said he would spend $20 million of it on road maintenance.

'If a reliable funding source of this magnitude became available, the lion's share would go to improving the condition of county roads, something that's been underfunded for far too long,' Gore stated.

Fudge said she would spend $5 million of the extra general fund money to chip away at the county's pension costs, which have ballooned since 2002 to more than $100 million. Gore made no mention of directing surplus money to paying down pension costs, including longterm unfunded liabilities of about $300 million.

In the same questionnaire, Gore said he would he would support raising employee pension contributions to limit taxpayer costs.

Fudge said she 'possibly' would support higher employee contributions 'after evaluation of current participation levels.'

In an interview, Fudge said Windsor has a robust, 'almost fully funded pension plan' for its employees and as well as enviable general fund reserves compared to other cities in Sonoma County. She acknowledged Windsor has an advantage since it contracts for police services with the county Sheriff's Office and receives fire protection from the independent Central Fire Authority.

'I have a background with employees and unions. I honor the workforce that serves the county,' Fudge said. 'There are very few that are making the high salary and beefy pensions some people think. Most of the workforce is making quite a bit less.'

Gore and Fudge also differ on how they'd vote on a proposed countywide ordinance spelling out 50- to 200-foot buffer zones along 3,200 miles of streams in unincorporated parts of the county. The ordinance, slated to go before the Board of Supervisors later this year, would create protections for sensitive plant and animal habitat on 82,000 acres of land.

Fudge said she supports the proposal, calling the safeguards 'reasonable,' while Gore said he would not vote in favor of the ordinance as-is.

'Regulations only tell people no,' Gore said. 'There are other ways to have good water quality and protect habitat.'

The final outcome of such debates, and decisions on a larger range of issues confronting the county in the coming years, now rests with voters, some of whom have already begun to return their ballots.

With partisan gridlock tying up Washington and many programs once run by Sacramento now being pushed to local agencies, the makeup of county and city governing bodies has seldom been more important, political experts said.

'Most of the sizzling, substantive issues today are happening at the county level. That's where the action is,' said McCuan, the Sonoma State professor. 'The stakes are really high.'

Staff Writer Angela Hart contributed to this report. You can reach Staff Writer Clark Mason at 521-5214 or clark. mason@pressdemocrat.com.