After months of pooh-poohing the special election, Democratic leaders and their union allies are in a furious effort to get voters to the polls.

They’ve opened a record 44 field offices throughout the state, mounted huge phone bank operations, lined up 10,000 people to walk precincts and plan a workplace mobilization all in an effort to defeat the four initiatives backed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Problem is the get-out-the-vote effort comes after many Democrats had initially argued that the Nov. 8 election was unnecessary. A September survey by the Public Policy Institute of California found that 53 percent of likely voters said the special election was a “bad idea.”

“When I go door-to-door and talk to voters, their first reaction is, ‘I’m not going to vote,'” said Andy Doyle, a Los Angeles County firefighter who is also a field coordinator for the unions’ special election voter turnout efforts. “It’s very time-consuming to try to change their minds.”

To defeat the four Schwarzenegger-backed initiatives, Democrats need to get more voters to the polls than usually turn out in special elections.

“Most voters don’t see the stakes as that high. The issues are not ones that galvanize voters,” said longtime Democratic strategist Darry Sragow. “But the Democrats and the unions must show that they can decisively defeat the Schwarzenegger-backed propositions. And to do that, they need a higher-than-normal turnout.”

Voter fatigue


The Schwarzenegger-supported measures are Proposition 74, which lengthens the time for teachers to get tenure; Proposition 75, which requires unions to get the consent of their members before using dues for political purposes; Proposition 76, which gives the governor more power to enact spending cuts; and Proposition 77, which overhauls the redistricting process.

Republicans face their own turnout issues, with polls showing three of the governor’s four initiatives trailing. That, in turn, has made it harder to raise funds.

Schwarzenegger’s allies have nearly $60 million, compared with $100 million for Democrats and their public-employee union allies.

“With no candidates on the ballot and voter fatigue after statewide elections in each of the last three years, it’s definitely harder to get people’s attention in this election,” said Karen Hanretty, a spokeswoman for the California Republican Party.

Hanretty said the party is targeting Republican voters in areas with high GOP registrations. “We’re putting a much greater emphasis on person-to-person voter contact in this election than in previous elections,” she said.

Both parties are also mounting intense campaigns to get voters to cast absentee ballots. As of last week, the L.A. County Registrar of Voters reported sending out 446,000 absentee ballots, up from 339,000 for the same time prior to the 2004 presidential primary and 351,000 prior to the 2003 recall. Not clear is whether this reflects increased interest in this ballot or part of an ongoing trend that has more voters casting absentee ballots.

Gauging turnout in a special election is tricky. There have only been two statewide issue-oriented special elections in the last 80 years. The last one, in 1993, drew 36 percent. “Turnout is very much an unknown right now,” Sragow said.

Another unknown: where voters in the political middle will gravitate. Schwarzenegger carried these independent voters by a huge margin in the recall election two years ago, but in this year’s polls, these moderate swing voters have deserted him.

Republican turnout


To recapture these voters, Schwarzenegger “has to explain more that this is a continuation of the recall, that it’s finishing the job that voters elected him to do,” said Joel Fox, president of the Small Business Action Committee and a close Schwarzenegger ally.

Schwarzenegger and the Republicans do have one advantage: In low-turnout elections, conservative Republicans are the ones most likely to cast ballots. That’s why they pushed so hard for a special election rather than having these measures go on the June 2006 primary ballot.

But Republicans are now on the defensive, with polls showing majorities of voters who say things are moving in the wrong direction with Republicans at the helm. The Democrats’ get-out-the-vote effort features 10,000 precinct walkers statewide, direct mail drops and phone banks.