Economy, Gangs Dominate Santa Paula Campaign

In the city with the lowest median income in Ventura County, the two issues that have dominated a race for two seats on the Santa Paula City Council have been revitalizing the local economy and cleaning up a growing gang problem.

Two veteran incumbents--Mayor Alfonso C. Urias and Councilman Leslie H. Maland--have 40 years in office between them. They are being challenged by Flo Zakrajshek, Robin Sullivan and Mark T. Florio.

Unlike a council race two years ago that was dominated by a debate over growth concerns, the talk this year has focused sharply on what do about vanishing stores and scarce jobs.

Urias and Maland voted to create the city’s new redevelopment agency three years ago. They say the stream of redevelopment tax dollars finally coming into the city will stimulate an economic revival.

“The machinery is in action now,” said Urias, who emphasizes that by law, one-fifth of the money must be spent on affordable housing.

Maland advocates the use of redevelopment funds as incentives to industries and retail stores willing to relocate in Santa Paula. “It won’t be easy, but I think we can get our share of new jobs,” Maland said.

The trio of challengers say they want a hand in determining how redevelopment funds will be spent, and contend that residents are ready for new faces in City Hall.

“I think I have a good perspective on the city,” said Sullivan, an attorney who is the two-term president of the town’s Chamber of Commerce. She identifies business revitalization as her top goal, and said the city needs a voice from the business community on the council.

Zakrajshek believes that Santa Paula needs more tourist attractions than just the Unocal Oil Museum and the old railroad depot to restore a run-down central district.

“I can remember Main Street when it was a viable economic part of the city,” said Zakrajshek, who owns Flo-Air Heating and Air Conditioning. “To see it now is heartbreaking.

“There has to be something to attract tourists and then a way for them to leave some money here,” she added.

Florio described the city’s economy as at a crossroads, and said he will concentrate on attracting new businesses to town and encouraging local start-up firms.

In addition to their economic concerns, both Maland and Zakrajshek identified gang activity as one of the city’s largest problems and said the city needs to make it a top priority.

According to police, about 120 hard-core gang members are responsible for a rise in theft, vandalism and assaults. Although police say they know who the gang members are, that has not been enough to stem the rash of gang-related crimes.

“It seems like a weekend doesn’t go by when there’s not a report of a shooting and a car driving off,” said Urias. All the candidates stress the need for counseling of youths and their families and better coordination with the police.

Maland calls for more recreational facilities for adolescents at risk for gang involvement, pointing to the closing of The Tower--the city’s only theater--as a symptom of what’s wrong. He is lobbying for a teen center and youth commission to address the problem.

Reports of heavy-handed enforcement of state and local building codes surfaced during the summer at City Council meetings. Although city officials called many of the complaints unjustified, the council has ordered training sessions for city staff to reduce the conflicts.

But Zakrajshek has called the complaints “the tip of the iceberg,” and predicts that residents will express their frustration with city officials at the ballot box.

The second oldest city in Ventura County, Santa Paula is also one of the most economically troubled. The median household income in the city of 25,000 was $31,605 in 1990, the lowest in the county.

As in other small towns, business along Santa Paula’s Main Street has slumped as residents have been lured away to shopping malls in larger cities.

Signs of a slump are easy to find on Main Street. Failed businesses are boarded up, others have closed and been replaced by low-priced thrift shops, and the town’s only movie theater has remained vacant for more than three years.

In an economic study completed three years ago, an Orange County consultant blamed much of the decline on an estimated $76.3 million in “retail sales leakage” outside the city.

Part of that leak was plugged with the construction of a Kmart store a year ago on the city’s west end--a project that was unpopular with some residents. Despite the sluggish economy, though, sales tax revenues have increased in Santa Paula since the Kmart opened.

“Kmart saved our hides,” said Urias.

Apart from the issues, the election pivots on the personalities of the candidates themselves.

Urias and Maland, the senior members on the five-member council, have gained numerous allies over the years, an advantage in a town where voters routinely refer to candidates by first name.

During their tenure, the two men led the effort to build the city’s community center and veterans memorial, and created the city’s redevelopment agency.

A councilman for 16 years, Urias, 68, is the only Latino council member in a city where Latinos represent 59% of the population but only 31% of the registered voters.

His election is important to many Latino residents of the city. Potential council candidate Bob Borrego, a former aide to state Sen. Gary K. Hart (D-Santa Barbara), said he decided at the last minute not to run because he feared that a split in the Latino vote could deny Urias reelection.

Since he was first elected, the former police officer and educator has broadened his base of support in the Anglo community and is considered a friend by many in the business community.

Maland, 71, is a retired engineering consultant who has served 24 years on the council and often plays the part of council historian at its meetings.

One obstacle that Maland must overcome is the promise he made four years ago not to seek another term. But Maland dismisses any concern, saying he wants to work on the city’s redevelopment plans, solid-waste and water issues.

And, he added, “there’s no way you can get me to run next time.”

The strongest challengers to the incumbents are Sullivan, the leader of the Chamber of Commerce, and Zakrajshek, a longtime community activist. Florio, a former civilian employee of the Navy at Port Hueneme, is the least known of the challengers.

Zakrajshek, 68, serves on the city’s Housing Authority and has made one previous bid for a council seat. She has participated in numerous community groups since first volunteering to teach reading at a grammar school years ago.

“As soon as word gets around that there’s a willing, warm body, one thing leads to another,” she said to explain her history of involvement.

Florio, 42, a former program manager at the Naval Ship Weapons System Engineering Station in Port Hueneme, moved to Santa Paula three years ago. He has donated time to the Santa Paula Mental Health Center.

Florio has described himself as a workaholic who toiled 120 hours a week while with the Navy and also earned three graduate degrees, including a doctoral degree, from National University, UC Santa Barbara and UCLA.

But officials at National University and UC Santa Barbara told The Times that Florio attended classes at those schools without earning a graduate degree. An official at UCLA--where Florio said he obtained his doctoral degree in history--said the school has no record that he ever attended.

When told that the three colleges said they had no records of him receiving graduate degrees, Florio recently insisted that the colleges were wrong and speculated that his records at UC Santa Barbara might have been destroyed in a fire during campus unrest in the early 1970s. But UCSB Assistant Registrar Margaret Anderson denied that the school has ever lost student records in a fire.

Florio has walked precincts and attended campaign forums during the council race, but recently said he was planning to leave town on business until after the election.

Sullivan, 43, is an attorney who many in town consider the business community’s rising star. Sullivan, who practices law with her husband in the refurbished stone house of town pioneer A. C. Hardison, is widely credited with revitalizing the chamber by motivating its members. Membership has grown by one-third during her two years at the chamber’s helm.

“I wanted to take the chamber from a social organization to the type of organization it should be--business-oriented,” Sullivan said.

In a contest devoid of mudslinging, the candidates have earned the praise of many residents who expect whoever wins to perform well.

Former councilman Carl Barringer, a contractor, described what he expects from the winners: “We want good-thinking people who can pick up some ideas when they attend the League of California Cities, and will then come back and apply them.”