Growth Tops Issues Facing County’s Voters

San Diego’s controversial slow-growth initiative tops the issues as voters in San Diego, Escondido, Chula Vista, Montgomery and Vista go to the polls today to decide a handful of local races and initiatives.

The polls, which opened at 7 a.m., were to remain open until 8 p.m. throughout the county.

The slow-growth initiative, Proposition A, has become a battleground for environmentalists and slow-growth advocates who, with meager resources, have taken on development companies and Campus Crusade for Christ, which have pumped more than $607,000 into a sophisticated media and mail campaign against the measure.

Proposition A was placed on the ballot by slow-growth advocates outraged by City Council approval of development proposals for the city’s “urban reserve”--more than 52,000 acres at the city’s north edge declared off limits to developers in the 1979 Growth Management Plan.

Using the measure, environmentalists hope to wrest control of development decisions in the urban reserve from the City Council by throwing the decisions open to a citywide vote.

Campus Crusade for Christ and Pardee Construction Co., two of the largest landowners in the reserve area, were the major donors in the campaign against the effort. Together the two organizations have contributed more than $400,000 in a record-setting $607,000 fund-raising effort. No side in any San Diego ballot measure has ever collected more, according to officials with the city clerk’s office.

San Diego voters today will also pick winners in four City Council races. While incumbents Ed Struiksma (District 5) and Gloria McColl (District 3) are expected to be easily returned to office, the two remaining races are considered very close.

Bill Mitchell, the District 1 incumbent who is bidding for a third term to represent north city neighborhoods such as La Jolla, is in a tough fight against challenger Abbe Wolfsheimer, who has waged a strong campaign.

In District 7, newcomers Jeanette Roache and Judy McCarty have run neck and neck in the race to fill the council spot vacated by Dick Murphy, who became a municipal judge in July.

San Diego City Clerk Chuck Abdelnour predicts voter turnout will be only 28% to 32%, despite the sometimes acrimonious council and Proposition A campaigns.

Meanwhile, other San Diego County voters are being asked to settle other issues. Those include:

- Whether Imperial Beach should allow card rooms and proceed with its plans for a redevelopment agency.

- Whether the unincorporated South Bay community of Montgomery should be annexed to the City of Chula Vista. Montgomery is also choosing seven members of its community planning group.

- Choosing two City Council members in Chula Vista, as well as deciding five charter revisions in that city. Those measures include making newly elected council members wait a month, instead of a week, to take office, and relieving the city clerk from the job of running Chula Vista school board elections.

- Whether Vista should establish a redevelopment agency. Residents in the North County community dismantled a redevelopment agency 10 years ago, and a vote is needed to create the new agency.

- Escondido voters will choose three winners in school board races.

Turnout in these elections is also expected to be low, said Nancy Tripp, supervisor of elections administration for the county. She said only 16% of the voters bothered to cast their ballots during the primaries, the poorest showing ever in the county.