Some black voters feel overlooked by Calif. candidates

SAN FRANCISCO -- Lately, Goldie Butler has been feeling a little ignored.

Sure, she still plans to cast her ballot in California's recall election next month, but for the 85-year-old black Democrat, it'll be mainly out of habit.

"Most of the other races have been mentioned more than the blacks have" by candidates, said Butler, who has voted in every major election for 60 years. "They just take for granted we're going to vote."

It's a sentiment that's being echoed by some of the state's black leaders. They note that while blacks make up only 6 percent of California's registered voters, that's still enough to make a difference in close votes on whether to replace Democratic Gov. Gray Davis, and whom to pick as his successor if he is recalled.

"Most of the candidates, they've not connected with the African-American community because they haven't reached out, haven't campaigned, haven't spoken to issues that really matter to this community," said John Mack, president of the Los Angeles Urban League, an advocacy group that serves blacks and other minorities.

"We're finding ourselves increasingly facing a challenge of too many candidates for elected office not taking the African-American vote as seriously as they need to."

In multicultural California, blacks are "the fourth minority," said David Bositis, a political analyst at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a think tank focused on black issues. Whites, at 69 percent of registered voters, are the largest group, according to a November 2002 Field Poll report. Hispanics are about 17 percent of registered voters and Asians are about 7 percent.

As the growing Hispanic population transforms the neighborhoods' ethnic mix, a gradual shift in political power also is taking place.

"There's a sense that the African-American voter has been pushed way to the margins of the political tapestry by Latinos," said Earl Ofari Hutchinson, president of the National Alliance for Positive Action, a racial and social justice group in Inglewood.

Democratic core

Nevertheless, blacks remain an important voting bloc, activists say.

Blacks are "the corest of the core Democrats," Hutchinson said. About 80 percent of blacks voted for Davis in 1998 and 2002, according exit polls.

Experts predict this election will be no different. For her part, Butler plans to vote 'no' on the recall.

"It's a waste," she said, during a weekly seniors' bingo and lunch meeting at San Francisco's Third Baptist Church. "We should be putting money in jobs and schools instead of spending that money for the recall."

Butler believes Davis, who recently held a town hall meeting with black residents of Los Angeles' Crenshaw district, is one of the few candidates giving black voters the respect they deserve -- though other campaigns are making contact with the black community.

Independent Arianna Huffington visited Los Angeles' African Marketplace on Labor Day. On Saturday, state Sen. Tom McClintock, a conservative Republican candidate, met with blacks in Inglewood at an event organized by Hutchinson's group.

Meanwhile, the leaders of the major parties say blacks are important to them.

State Democratic Party chairman Art Torres said blacks have been "consistently loyal to the Democratic party, and we're going to be reaching out to them as part of this campaign as well."

Mike Vallante, chief operating officer of the California Republican Party, said every voting bloc is crucial in this unprecedented election.

But for some activists, the recall evokes memories of the disenfranchisement of black voters in Florida during the 2000 presidential election.

"The whole process was just totally hijacked," said Alona Clifton, president of the Oakland and Berkeley chapter of Black Women Organized for Political Action. "Davis was elected fairly in November and put in office by a majority of the voting electorate."

Former President Bill Clinton's planned trip today to First AME Church in South Central Los Angeles could also make a strong case to blacks.

In arguing against the recall, Clinton can say "this is another effort by the right wing to accomplish in other ways what they cannot accomplish at the ballot box," said Robert Smith, a political science professor at San Francisco State University.

Proposition 54, which is on the same ballot, may also draw blacks to the polls. It would ban the state from using race, ethnicity or national origin to classify people in public education, contracting and employment.

The proposition is opposed by many minority groups, which say it would prevent the state from tracking information vital for fighting diseases and hate crimes. Julian Bond, chairman of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, called it a "sinister plot to undermine the enforcement of civil rights."

Alice Huffman, president of the NAACP's California state conference, said it plans to contact 50,000 people by mail urging them to vote no on the recall and Proposition 54. NAACP branches are also registering voters and distributing educational materials.