Longtime political feud plays key role in Valley race

Published online on Monday, Oct. 06, 2008

For political junkies, the race for a South Valley Assembly seat has it all -- a long-standing feud, campaign cash pouring in and an unpredictable finish.

Set aside the sizzle, and there are broader implications.

The 30th District is a longtime legislative battleground, one of the few districts in the state where neither party dominates. The GOP candidate has fallen just short in the last three elections.

But with the Democratic incumbent termed out, Republicans say they have their best shot in years to flip the seat in their favor.

The race pits Republican Danny Gilmore, 58, a retired highway patrolman from Hanford who is making his second run at the seat, against Democrat Fran Florez, 65, a Shafter City Council member and former bank branch manager.

The mostly rural district covers Kings County and parts of Fresno, Tulare and Kern counties.

Two familiar names not on the ballot are playing a big role: termed-out Democratic incumbent Nicole Parra, who has made political waves by supporting the GOP's Gilmore, and state Sen. Dean Florez, D-Shafter, Fran's son and a Parra rival.

The Parra-Florez feud is legendary in the Valley, and the Assembly race is shaping up to be a proxy battle between the two politicians.

Parra beat Gilmore by 1,717 votes in 2006, then turned on her party to endorse him last month.

"I think he's the best person for the job and will continue to fight for the issues that are important to me in the Valley," said Parra, a moderate Democrat who has supported business-friendly legislation, like using state money to pay for dams.

Establishment Democrats say her endorsement is hypocritical.

"Two years ago, Nicole Parra spent $2 million telling voters Danny Gilmore was a dishonest politician," Democratic Party chairman Art Torres said in a recent statement. "Now she endorses him. We can only conclude that she is just as dishonest."

The Florez-Parra feud goes back years.

Parra said it dates to 1998, when she was helping with Florez's campaign for the Assembly. Years later, Dean Florez ran one of his office staffers, Michael Rubio, against her father, Pete Parra, for a seat on the Kern County Board of Supervisors. Pete Parra, the longtime incumbent, lost the race.

Dean Florez is "just not an easy person to work with," Nicole Parra said. "I don't like him and don't respect him."

Florez responded: "We have different styles and she doesn't like mine, so no big deal to me. But why take it out on my mom?"

The 2006 race was a bruising and expensive fight typical of the battles waged in the district, which includes parts of Bakersfield, all of Hanford and several small farming towns.

Gilmore ran ads claiming Parra "liberally spent our tax dollars" on welfare programs. Parra returned fire, linking Gilmore to an epidemic of high-ranking California Highway Patrol officers retiring with lucrative, sometimes questionable, disability claims.

Gilmore retired in 2003 as assistant chief to the central division headquarters in Fresno. He went on short-term disability before retiring and collecting permanent disability.

Gilmore made his medical records available, showing he had arthroscopic knee surgery in the late 1990s and continued to suffer from degenerative arthritis that kept him from performing some patrol tasks.

Gilmore and Parra patched things up after the election, and both say it was never personal.

Parra is a "very nice person," Gilmore said. "We're going to have differences." But "people want [Democrats and Republicans] to come together and try to solve problems for the district."