Penman reflects on San Bernardino mayoral race

By Andrew Edwards
Staff Writer
SAN BERNARDINO -- City Attorney James F. Penman said he's ready for the political climate at City Hall to calm down after his defeat in the mayoral election.

"I hope it changes. I've extended the olive branch to the mayor several times," Penman said Wednesday.

Semi-official election results credited Penman with 37 percent of the vote. Mayor Pat Morris was reelected with about 55 percent of votes cast.

Whatever the number of olive branches that have been extended between Penman and Morris, there have also been repeated flare-ups between the two officials within City Hall and on the campaign trail.

The most recent tensions grew out of a memo that was leaked during the Sept. 21 City Council meeting. The document reported circumstances of a sex offender who performed work at a church that hosts a city youth center.

The council voted that day to demand the church ban sex offenders or lose money that pays for the youth center. Penman accused Morris of trying to cover up a danger to children and sent investigators to pass out notification flyers around the church.

Local clergy viewed the ultimatum as a threat to their First Amendment rights and crowded an October council meeting to protest Penman's and the council's actions. A council majority rescinded its demand.

At the time, Penman called protest a campaign stunt organized by pro-Morris clergy. Wednesday, he said he didn't think the episode was a decisive moment in the campaign.
"I think the mayor has a strong following. He's very charismatic and I think a lot of people like him," Penman said.

Penman said on election night that Morris' support probably includes a contingent of ex-convicts. He did not press that line of argument in an interview Wednesday.

Penman's signature campaign issue was an eastside redevelopment project that is intended to transform a cluster of apartments along 19th Street and Sunrise Lane.

Morris viewed the project, which would include the demolition of 144 apartment units, as means to transform the area and provide housing to people who are poor, but law abiding.

Penman maintained that federal requirements to lease 100 units to low-income tenants would eventually result in parolees living in apartments improved at taxpayer expense.

"I did the best I could to stop it by running for mayor," Penman said.