Central County : Sanitary District Subject of Midway City Election

After enduring a three-day strike this month and getting a $1.25 rate hike earlier in the year, voters in the Midway City Sanitary District will choose from three incumbents and three challengers and decide whether a public vote should be taken for any future rate increases.

Board members Richard E. Olson, James V. Evans and Bruce D. Finlayson will be opposed by Anthony Nelson Jr., who lists his occupation as political science major; Dewey Wiles, an Orange County sheriff’s deputy, and businesswoman Allegra Fieldman. The ballot measure asks voters whether the district should call “an advisory election if there is any change” in the trash rates, which are now levied at $4 a month for each of the district’s 85,000 residential customers.

On Oct. 2, the district’s 46 employees went on strike because the district had not made an offer in contract negotiations. They returned when the board made a 1% opening offer. However, union attorney James Harker walked away from the bargaining table last week and vowed not to return until after the election, saying that the current board suffers from a “lack of direction.”

In the Santa Ana Unified School District, two incumbents, longtime trustee Mary J. Pryer and James A. Richards are fighting to retain their seats against five challengers, including three Latino candidates.

While the district is plagued with severe overcrowding, lack of building funds and poor relations with city government, parents of Latino students--who make up almost 70% of the school district’s 35,000 students--would like to elect a Latino to the board. The last Latino was Cordelia Gutierrez, who left in 1978.

Challengers include Louisa Pedroza Solis and Emilio De La Cruz, who are Mexican-American, and Samuel Nodarse, a Cuban-American. Also running are Patsy Campbell and Robert B. Palmer, who won endorsements from board members Joan Wilkinson, James Ward and Sadie Reid.