Opinion
Richmond voters defy Chevron coup
San Francisco Chronicle
Published 6:00 am, Friday, November 7, 2014

Photo: Carlos Avila Gonzalez / The Chronicle

After a vote affirming the mayor's proposal to use eminent domain to prevent foreclosures, City Councilman Jael Myrick addresses the audience during a city council meeting on Tuesday, September 10, 2013, in Richmond, Calif.
On Tuesday night, Richmond proved that no amount of Chevron-paid television advertisements, mailers and billboards can buy elections. Voters rejected all four candidates backed by Chevron, despite the oil giant’s investment of more than $3 million — outspending the 10-year-old Richmond Progressive Alliance by a 20-to-1 ratio.
Voters decided to elect City Councilman Tom Butt as mayor along with outgoing Mayor Gayle McLaughlin, incumbent Jovanka Beckles and retired teacher Eduardo Martinez to the City Council. Jael Myrick defeated incumbent Corky Boozé.
“There is no question the amount of money Chevron spent completely backfired on them,” said Myrick. “People are smarter than that, and if they get the perception you’re trying to buy them, that’s an insult in of itself.”
It didn’t take long for people to notice how pervasive corporate spending has become in order to influence local politics.

Big money politics suffers big blow in Richmond as Chevron spending backfires
By Robert Rogers Contra Costa Times
Posted:   11/05/2014 04:20:56 PM PST| Updated:   a day ago

Richmond mayoral candidate Tom Butt, second from right, sips a beer while watching early election results with supporter Jayson Fennimore, right, during an election party at the Baltic Restaurant on Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2014 in Richmond, Calif. (Aric Crabb/Bay Area News Group) ( ARIC CRABB )
RICHMOND -- What does $3.1 million in campaign spending by one of the world's largest corporations buy in Richmond?
Boulevards studded with billboards, mailboxes stuffed with fliers and fleets of campaign workers -- but no seats on the City Council.
Voters on Tuesday rejected the avalanche of spending by Chevron -- perhaps the most ever by a corporation in a local election -- in the oil giant's effort to tilt the balance of power on a City Council that has grown increasingly hostile toward its mammoth refinery here in recent years. Instead, voters handed the energy Goliath an embarrassing black eye, tapping a slate of progressive anti-Chevron candidates who promise resolute oversight of the city's largest taxpayer in the years ahead -- including a lawsuit stemming from the August 2012 refinery fire that sent thousands to the hospital.

Richmond mayoral candidate Nat Bates, right, hugs supporter Cherish Lincoln, 7, left, during an election night party on Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2014, in Richmond, Calif. (Aric Crabb/Bay Area News Group) ( ARIC CRABB )
Chevron's campaign, which drew national scorn and was waged by a phalanx of campaign committees steered by San Francisco public relations firms, culminated in a stunning repudiation. Candidates backed by the Richmond Progressive Alliance, a mostly volunteer organization, emerged with a tighter grip than ever on local government. Six of the seven council seats could soon be occupied by progressive-leaning politicians critical of the refinery.
"As a political scientist, one has to look at this outcome with a smile," said Robert Smith, a San Francisco State University professor who followed the race. "People who believe in democracy got a boost; this showed that people can organize and triumph, and over big money."
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Longtime Councilman Tom Butt easily defeated Chevron-backed Nat Bates for mayor, and "Team Richmond," comprising outgoing Mayor Gayle McLaughlin, incumbent Jovanka Beckles and newcomer Eduardo Martinez, appear to have nailed down the three full-term council seats, despite relentless attacks by a Chevron-backed political action committee that portrayed them as everything from absentee politicians to, in McLaughlin's case, a lobbyist for Cuban spies.

Political mailers are dealing with the Richmond City Council races are photographed in Walnut Creek, Calif., on Monday, Oct. 27, 2014. (Susan Tripp Pollard/Bay Area News Group) ( SUSAN TRIPP POLLARD )
With an undetermined number of mail-in and provisional ballots still to be counted, Martinez led longtime incumbent Jim Rogers by 292 votes for the third council seat.
The four candidates backed by Moving Forward, the committees into which Chevron poured money, all lost.
Chevron spokesman Braden Reddall issued a statement early Wednesday. "The voters have spoken, and Chevron will work hard to find common ground with this City Council to push for sound policies that allow Richmond to grow and thrive," he wrote.
A range of factors likely played roles in the outcome, according to longtime political observers and candidates.
The 2012 fire, sparked by a corroded pipe that investigators said should have been replaced, helped sully the refinery's standing in the community. A flurry of media attention cast a harsh spotlight on Chevron's campaign efforts, which included a community news website that reported unflattering stories of Chevron's political rivals, sometimes with anonymous sources.
The decision to go negative may have also backfired, some said, as the flood of kitschy television ads and mailers that attacked Beckles, Martinez and McLaughlin apparently failed to defeat any of them.
"At various polling places yesterday, people would shake my hand and tell me they saw the Chevron mailers attacking me and that I had their support; they were tired of the garbage," Martinez said. "Chevron's mailers attacking me actually worked for me."
A poll conducted by the Richmond Small Business Association and the West Contra Costa Business Association in September found that Chevron had just a 13 percent favorable rating among local voters polled.
"Many voters weren't necessarily pro-progressive or anti-Chevron; they just didn't like the idea that Chevron was intent on buying the election," said Jim McMillan, a Richmond councilman in the 1980s and 1990s. "The billboards looking down on every street, the fliers stuffing your mailbox everyday, it was kind of frightening."
With Butt taking the mayoral gavel, the progressive majority on the council is positioned to appoint another of their allies to fill his council seat.
Chevron's loss on its electoral gamble puts three major issues on the front burner: the city's potentially costly lawsuit against the refinery, which it is now expected to fiercely pursue; the refinery's ongoing efforts to modernize; and the city's stalled effort to use eminent domain to seize underwater mortgages from banks to stem foreclosures.
The eminent domain scheme bogged down in part because of opposition from Rogers. If the results hold up and he loses his re-election bid, the plan has new life.
"With the new council, Richmond will continue to be the trendsetter for local, state and national policies," Martinez said. "Eminent domain is one of those, and I think it will become a tool the cities across the country will use."
As for the relationship between the RPA and Chevron, which have refused to work together in the past, Martinez said he and his allies were eager for a seat at the table as equals, and signaled that future developments with the modernization project would be scrutinized. The City Council signed off on the environmental impact report for the project this summer.
Bates, the lone Chevron ally who will retain a council seat, said the relationship with the refinery is "going to be rough" with the new governing coalition.
The RPA may be "punitive," Bates warned during recorded remarks after his mayoral defeat.

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