Merger Critics Beat Odds by Pressing Attack : Coalition: Unlikely allies in utilities fight invoked specter of ‘Los Angelization’ of San Diego. They said jobs would be lost and environment damaged.

SAN DIEGO —  When the $1.8-billion merger of Southern California Edison with San Diego Gas & Electric was proposed nearly three years ago, very few observers gave local opponents a chance of prevailing against the considerable political might--and big bucks--of SCEcorp, Edison’s Rosemead-based parent company, and its formidable chairman, Howard Allen.

But the merger brought together an unlikely coalition of opponents who on Wednesday emerged victorious. The group’s members ranged from Democratic Mayor Maureen O’Connor and Sierra Club environmentalists to the Greater San Diego Chamber of Commerce and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 465.

In its lobbying efforts, the coalition hammered away at the negatives: the loss of 1,400 jobs in San Diego, adverse environmental effects, the unclear advantages to ratepayers of a merger.

Many saw it as a test of San Diego’s autonomy against the tide of “Los Angelization” and the growing loss of local control over San Diego’s destiny, not to mention the flight of corporate headquarters to the metropolis to the north. As San Diegans like to say, there is much more between San Diego and Los Angeles than Camp Pendleton.

“The fundamental flaw in the whole equation was when (former SCEcorp Chairman) Howard Allen thought he could bulldoze everything over,” said Lee Grissom, chairman of the Greater San Diego Chamber of Commerce.

Working with a shoestring budget, Coalition for Local Control, a loose-knit group formed by the Chamber of Commerce, was able to piece together an anti-merger TV and radio campaign that painted SCEcorp as an out-of-town bully that wanted to grab control of SDG&E.; The coalition also whipped up an anti-merger letter-writing campaign aimed at legislators and the state Public Utilities Commission.

Perhaps the coalition’s greatest accomplishment was bringing together consumer, business and labor groups that had seldom found common ground--an important asset in its arguments before the PUC.

That the coalition won was “really a David and Goliath victory,” said Max Schetter, Chamber of Commerce research director. Sierra Club conservation coordinator Barbara Bamberger said she was “pleasantly surprised” when she heard that the merger was rejected.

In the afterglow of victory, many credited O’Connor’s vocal opposition and her mobilization of the city’s legal machinery to oppose the proposal. The city spent $6.2 million in legal and consulting fees to fight the merger, a lot at a time of extreme budget constraints, but a pittance in contrast to the $100 million the utilities spent to promote the merger.

Others pointed to Utility Consumers Action Network Executive Director Michael Shames, an attorney who marshaled a compelling array of facts to present to regulatory bodies. His group is a San Diego-based consumer watchdog agency funded by member ratepayers.

“It’s a positive that we are able to keep a major employer headquartered in San Diego and to keep the concept of this region as really its own region, and this utility as our own utility, not to mention keeping all those jobs in (San Diego),” said Bob Morris, executive director of the San Diego Building Industry Assn.

Local disappointment over the decision was largely confined to SDG&E;’s top officials, who despite the stunning setback continued to portray the proposed merger as the best method of guaranteeing low utility rates and a dependable source of energy.

“To say that I’m disappointed would be an understatement,” Tom Page, SDG&E; chairman and chief executive officer, said at a news conference at the utility’s headquarters. “We’ve been working on this merger as the superior alternative in meeting the energy needs for San Diego and southern Orange County. We felt that a very strong case had been made.”

However, as he has throughout the debate over the proposed merger, Page stressed that the utility has been “on a parallel planning track to move forward as a stand-alone company if we need to.”

Times staff writer Greg Johnson in San Francisco contributed to this story.