CALIFORNIA ELECTS GARAMENDI AS INSURANCE COMMISSIONER AGAIN.

California elected John Garamendi its insurance commissioner again, 12 years after he first won the office.

Democrat Garamendi took nearly 47 percent of the vote, with Republican lawyer Gary Mendoza second with about 42 percent in a field with four other candidates.

Both candidates said they wanted to strengthen the Insurance Department's consumer-protection role and take on problems in the insurance industry, including the workers' compensation system.

Mendoza, a former corporations commissioner, criticized Garamendi's first term as insurance commissioner from 1991 to 1995, particularly his handling of the seizure and liquidation of bankrupt Executive Life Insurance Co. Garamendi defended his first term and the seizure of Executive Life, saying he wanted another chance to help policyholders get back the money they lost.

A former state senator, he left the commissioner's office to run unsuccessfully for governor but said this time he had no ambition beyond serving eight more years as commissioner.

The insurance industry fought Garamendi throughout his first term. The same initiative that made the office an elective post, Proposition 103 of 1988, also rolled back insurance rates and imposed prior approval of rates, and insurers filed a succession of lawsuits to block his regulations to implement it.

After Garamendi left office, the industry got a commissioner more to its liking, Republican Chuck Quackenbush. But he was forced to resign during investigations into corruption in his office, and an appointed commissioner served out his term.

This year, all candidates pledged to refuse insurance industry contributions. But the California Republican Party transferred more than $1 million to Mendoza's campaign, and consumer activists said much of the money came from the industry.