On the Record Sauerbrey and Glendening are running against each other for a second time. (File Photo)

By Donald P. Baker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, October 11, 1998; Page A01

Montgomery County has become the grand prize in the final weeks of the closely contested campaign for governor, as Democratic Gov. Parris N. Glendening and Republican challenger Ellen R. Sauerbrey joust for votes in Maryland's most prosperous and populous jurisdiction.

Both camps consider a strong showing in Montgomery indispensable to victory next month and are crafting electoral strategies with an eye toward capturing the county's mostly Democratic -- but independent-minded -- voters.

In mailings, commercials and speeches, Sauerbrey is hitting hard at the issues of most concern to county residents: traffic and education. In a sharp break with Glendening, she proposes building the Intercounty Connector to help relieve gridlock in northern Montgomery, and she embraces tougher standards to keep unqualified teachers out of the classroom.

Glendening supporters of all ages turned out Saturday at the Oktoberfest in Germantown. (Juana Arias – The Washington Post)

Glendening, meanwhile, has lavished record amounts of state financial aid on Montgomery, hoping to win the affections of what many analysts agree is a county electorate increasingly inclined to vote its parochial interests. The governor chose Bethesda as the locale 10 days ago to announce $381 million in transportation projects for the next year, including $93 million for road improvements in Montgomery -- more than for any other place in the state.

That same day, Glendening pledged to spearhead a suburb-to-suburb expansion of the Metrorail system that would roughly parallel the Capital Beltway in Montgomery and Prince George's counties. Although the potential $15 billion price tag over two decades may cause Baltimore voters to wince, county politicians believe the proposal will play well in Montgomery, where the Metro system is popular.

County Executive Douglas M. Duncan, a Democrat and strong Glendening ally, said it is no coincidence that the two candidates have placed such emphasis on Montgomery.

"We are becoming the California of Maryland," Duncan said. "If you want to win statewide, you've got to do well in Montgomery. Every year we're getting more voters, becoming stronger and able to determine the outcome of statewide elections."

Montgomery has assumed increasing clout in state politics in part because of its rising share of the state's population and because its politicians have increasingly asserted the county's interests. But Duncan noted they have shed a reputation as "dilettantes fighting among ourselves" and are concerned as much about the poor in inner-city Baltimore as their own constituents' desire for green space, bike paths and more school aid from Annapolis.

"Because we are the financial engine of the state, there is a perception that we don't always get back our contributions," said Sharon Cox, president of the 53,000-member Montgomery PTA Council.

Montgomery is different from its stereotypical reputation as the whitest and most homogeneous of Washington's Maryland suburbs. The county's 837,000 residents represent a kaleidoscope of backgrounds, from an established Jewish community of 100,000, an equal number of African Americans, and burgeoning neighborhoods that are home to half of Maryland's Hispanics and Asians.

Although the county still can boast that its public school students have the highest average SAT scores in the state, nearly one in five students comes from a family whose income qualifies them for free or reduced lunches. Foreign-speaking pupils, including 15,000 international students from 150 countries, account for half of all Maryland students enrolled in classes for non-English speakers.

Montgomery is seen as crucial in the election not only because of its size, but also because its voters -- who identify themselves in almost equal numbers as liberal and conservative -- traditionally turn out in a higher proportion than elsewhere. Moreover, Republicans are more competitive with Democrats than in Prince George's and Baltimore City, which, along with Montgomery, were the only jurisdictions that Glendening carried when he defeated Sauerbrey by a total of only 5,993 votes four years ago.

Although Democrats still outnumber Republicans nearly 2 to 1 in Montgomery, county voters have historically shown a willingness to support Republicans, especially at the federal level -- although usually ones more moderate than Sauerbrey. Indeed, U.S. Rep. Constance A. Morella, who represents most of the county on Capitol Hill and goes out of her way to bill herself as "the most liberal Republican" in Congress, has mostly absented herself from Sauerbrey's side this election season.

Still, many analysts see room for Sauerbrey to make inroads in Montgomery, which Glendening captured by a 44,000-vote margin, or 59 percent to 41 percent, in 1994. Political advisers on both sides expect that Glendening will again carry Montgomery, but they believe Sauerbrey can win overall if she can improve her showing in the county.

Sauerbrey considers Montgomery so critical that she is, in effect, running two campaigns, one in Montgomery and one in the rest of Maryland, complete with separate budgets, ad campaigns and issues. Sauerbrey's two-tiered effort is a tactic borrowed from Virginia, where Republican James S. Gilmore III was propelled into the governor's mansion last year by showing a more moderate face in Fairfax County than he did in the rest of the state.

In theory, Glendening's support of abortion rights, gun control and environmental regulation should play well among Montgomery's more moderate to liberal voters. The governor has also won over many once-skeptical Montgomery political leaders, including Duncan, by giving more school construction money to Montgomery -- $144 million in the last four years -- than any other Maryland jurisdiction. County officials say such funding has been the top legislative objective for Montgomery, where schools have been hard-pressed to cope with swelling student enrollment.

But Sauerbrey and her advisers are calculating that the governor has been hurt in the county by his financial support for two new professional football stadiums, as well as a controversial pension deal he at first accepted -- then rejected -- from his tenure as Prince George's county executive. Both stadiums were intensely unpopular in Montgomery, and all but five members of the county's 24 delegates opposed the $220 million in state funding for the Baltimore stadium.

"He turned me off with the stadiums," said Al Fields, 79, a resident of Leisure World in Silver Spring, who said he voted for Glendening the last time. Fields said he will switch to Sauerbrey next month, especially since she has proposed a new tax break for the elderly.

Sauerbrey aides promise they will remind Montgomery voters about the stadiums in the final weeks of the campaign.

"She plans to make Glendening's role in forcing the taxpayers to absorb that cost very, very clear to the voters of Montgomery," said Sauerbrey spokesman Jim Dornan.

Republicans are also pushing hard to raise Sauerbrey's profile among key ethnic groups and other constituencies, distributing Spanish leaflets in the Silver Spring area while expanding contacts with Jewish groups. She is making a strong appeal to business leaders by promising to build the ICC and to make the Interstate 270 technology corridor more competitive with Virginia.

Inside the Bethesda Marriott on Wednesday night, Sauerbrey and former Virginia governor George Allen were greeted warmly by Montgomery builders, bankers and business owners, who paid $100 to $500 to hear her message of fiscal conservatism. But outside, a sign of potential trouble materialized when three dozen picketers showed up to protest her record on the environment.

Waving a "Sauerbrey for Governor of Virginia" sign, Betsy Johnson of the Sierra Club said developers "support Sauerbrey because they want to put roads through our protected land," including the ICC and a western bypass around the region.

Some ordinary Montgomery voters echo such sentiments. Suzelle Aymot, 24, a biochemist who lives in Rockville, said she will vote for Glendening because "he's always standing up for the environment," such as when he banned activity on some rivers on the Eastern Shore last year when the toxic microbe Pfiesteria piscicida threatened the Chesapeake Bay.

Glendening is hoping such views will override voter anxiety about money spent on stadiums or about lapses in judgment. The governor is also working hard to sow doubts about the fiscal integrity of Sauerbrey's tax-cutting plans and to highlight her conservative legislative record -- which he argues is out of step with Montgomery residents.

"The real Ellen Sauerbrey," his latest ads intone: "A risk we can't afford."

Dan Meijer, who has fixed televisions and stereos in his shop in Silver Spring for 22 years, is a small-business owner whom Sauerbrey might see as a natural supporter, but he is chary of her promise simultaneously to cut taxes and improve the quality of life.

"We would like to see good government and good government services, but most of us are realistic enough to know that costs money," Meijer said. "So to campaign on the basis of reducing taxes without being honest enough to admit you have to cut services is irresponsible. The voter should be made aware of what services you intend to cut, and then he can decide which candidate has the best agenda for the average person."