Ventura councilman says phone survey won't hurt

Neal Andrews says that he remains confident a telephone survey he’s labeled as a smear campaign won’t harm his chances for re-election, where the longtime incumbent looks to regain his seat on the Ventura City Council in November.

“I don’t really think I need to overcome it, to be honest,” Andrews says. “I’m going to continue my campaign pretty much as I’d planned. The fact is we have a very positive campaign. I have a very strong track record of accomplishments.

That’s what I’m going to rely on, and I think the voters will re-elect me because of that.”

Andrews’ response follows that of the Ventura Police Officers Association — which represents sergeants, corporals and officers — whose spokesman reaffirmed this week that the brief survey held late last month was not a biased push poll designed to malign Andrews, nor was it an automated “robocall.”

Rather, said the association’s president John Snowling, the phone survey, a first for the 122-member Ventura PD organization, was intended not only to obtain opinions on important issues like Measure A, a proposed citywide sales tax increase, but to gain insight on candidates in one of the city’s largest city council races in years.

“There are 15 candidates and so many issues,” Snowling said. “We wanted to learn how they were intertwined.”

Snowling also believes that the survey, and whatever backlash it may cause, won’t hurt the police union’s stability on the whole. The union, known for being at odds with Andrews over pension reform, didn’t develop its survey around that issue, he said.

“The pension stuff is kind of a separate issue for us,” Snowling said. “This has to do with the election and measures on the ballot. We wanted to know what measures we were going to support or not, or stay neutral.”

Snowling backed up that notion by comparing together the city’s police and firefighters’ unions, the latter of whom were seeking greater compensations. According to Snowling, the police union has in place a retirement package that pays out former officers 3 percent after age 50 for every year they worked. That’s compared to the firefighters union, he said, whose lesser, 2 percent payout after 55 the group has sought to increase.

However, a Web site titled Ventura County Fact Check lists a sample of the alleged phone survey questions, where the police pension reform topic is brought up.

“Mr. Andrews says he supports public safety, but he has consistently voted against fair and equitable pay and benefits for police and fire personnel,” one of the statements reads.

Another says, “Did you know that Councilman Andrews has voted for more tax and fee increases than any other Council member?”

And yet another statement that was part of the survey, according to the Web site, claimed, “Councilman Andrews led the effort to make it legal for people to sleep in cars in Ventura, promoting drug dealing.”

He was not called for the survey, but Andrews was aware of the content on the Web site and responded to that last claim, saying it was just one example of how the union utilized erroneous language and “totally misrepresented” the truth.

Andrews, arguably the council’s biggest anti-homelessness proponent, said that the survey statement, in reference to the city’s proposed Safe Sleep homeless car parking program, alluded that the chance of increased drug use in the local homeless community was entirely his fault.

“They tried to link me up to drug dealing,” he says.

Snowling, who also viewed the Web site, staunchly maintains that none of the statements it lists were a part of the union’s survey.

Two Ventura women who were called for the survey say that while the survey did balance questions between important campaign issues and Andrews, they were weighed against the councilman.

“I was called a week ago on Monday or Tuesday night. They just said they’d like to do a survey regarding how I felt the city was moving in the right direction,” says Kathy Kinnear. “And then they were just (aimed) at Councilman Andrews. It seems so odd how they drew those questions in amongst those other things.”

“Eighty to 90 percent of the poll was fine. But the last five questions were all about Neal Andrews,” says Kathy Wertheim. “They were clearly nasty and designed to push an opinion at me.”

For Wertheim, an Andrews supporter, the survey backfired in its intent.

“I intend to talk to as many people I know who are registered voters and tell them the police union is doing some pretty nasty stuff in Ventura against Neal Andrews, and that’s enough to vote for him. He certainly has my vote,” she said. “It’s kind of tainted me against the man I perceive to be their candidate.”

The union, in a press release from last week, has endorsed three council incumbents — Jim Monahan, Brian Brennan and Ed Summers — and Mike Tracy, a former Ventura police chief.

Andrews says he will leave it to voters, and his constituency, to decide.

“I was just very disappointed anybody who’d attempt to use that sort of tactic,” he says. “I think the public is going to be very, very concerned they would employ this kind of tactic.”

Andrews said he was unsure if he would pursue legal action against the police union, or if he would file a complaint with the state Fair Political Practice Commission. Snowling maintains that the survey was conducted in compliance with the FPPC.

Snowling also said that results of the survey, including its cost, will be made available by the end of the month. Other media reports previously disputed the number of people surveyed, saying that such details must be made public immediately if more than 500 people participate.

Snowling confirmed this week that the survey included no more than 350 people.

“Even if our survey asked 1,000 people,” he said, “it would not violate that (FPPC) rule.”   

paul@vcreporter.com