Turnout of Only 12% Predicted for Tuesday’s Voting

Despite several heated school board elections, only 12% of Orange County’s 1,059,915 registered voters are expected to go to the polls Tuesday.

The Orange County registrar of voters office said it is forecasting the low turnout because voters in the past have been apathetic in off-year elections. Only 11% of the county’s registered voters turned out in 1981 and 1983.

However, a flurry of 11th-hour campaigning in the past few days--including a controversial mailer in one race--may produce a somewhat larger turnout. In four campaigns, teachers’ unions are mounting major efforts to oust school board incumbents and replace them with union-endorsed candidates.

Those focal races are in the Saddleback Community College District (Saddleback College and Irvine Valley College); Coast Community College District (Golden West College, Coastline Community College and Orange Coast College); Huntington Beach Union High School District (Edison High, Huntington Beach High, Fountain Valley High, Ocean View High, Marina High and Westminster High), and Tustin Unified School District.

In addition to the dominant union-versus-incumbents races, there are also school board elections in every other part of the county.

Rancho Santiago Community College District (Rancho Santiago College in Santa Ana) and North Orange County Community College District (Fullerton College and Cypress College) are electing trustees, and there are school board seats open in all 28 elementary and secondary school districts.

There also are several non-education races on Tuesday’s ballots, including:

- A vote in Mission Viejo to create a “community services district,” a move that could be the first step toward cityhood.

- Election of three council members in Buena Park.

- An advisory vote in Brea about whether the city should ban fireworks.

- A proposed charter amendment in Placentia that would make the city’s elections coincide with state and federal elections. The city also has two advisory measures on the ballot about proposed civic improvements.

- Water district and sanitary district elections in several communities.

The school board races are the most numerous in Tuesday’s elections, and they are the ones generating the most political interest.

The huge Saddleback Community College District, which takes in all of south Orange County, has the hottest of the campaigns. The voting will culminate more than two years of battle between the incumbent college district board and the Saddleback Faculty Assn., which is the teachers’ union.

The union two years ago asked the incumbent board to fire Chancellor Larry Stevens, charging that he “hired cronies,” wasted money on administrative frills and was dictatorial. The board refused. Union members thereupon were active in an unsuccessful recall effort against three of the seven-member board of trustees.

In recent months, the union’s focus has been on electing its three candidates--Iris Swanson (who is in the Area 4 race), Joan J. Hueter (Area 2) and Marcia Milchiker (Area 5)--and ousting two incumbents, William (Bill) Watts (Area 2) and Robert L. Price (Area 5). The third incumbent whose seat is up for election, Eugene McKnight, chose not to seek reelection.

Mike Eggers, an aide to Rep. Ron Packard (R-Carlsbad), is among four candidates for McKnight’s seat. Eggers has clashed with the teachers’ union and accused it of being behind a mailer last week that accused him of unethical behavior and links to an alleged “racketeer.” Eggers said the accusations were “lies.”

The Orange County Republican Party denounced the mailer, which was distributed by a group calling itself the “Orange County Republican Taxpayer Federation.” A party leader said the group is not recognized by either the county or state GOP organization.

Union Disavows Connection

Thom Evans, president of the Saddleback Faculty Assn., has said the union has no connection with the controversial mailer.

In addition to Eggers and Swanson, there are two other candidates in the heated Area 4 race, Ian Doyer, who is retired, and Cal State Fullerton sociology professor Perry E. Jacobson, who has McKnight’s endorsement.

Other candidates in the Saddleback college district race are Gerald A. Wolf (Area 2) and Burl Hobson (Area 5).

In neighboring Coast Community College District, the teachers’ union is seeking to oust the last incumbent of a board that two years ago laid off about 100 faculty members in a budget-cutting maneuver. The union, furious over the move, was successful in 1983 in electing three union-endorsed candidates to the board. Those three assumed control over the five-member board.

Incumbent George Rodda Jr., who was a carry-over member from the old board, chose not to seek reelection this year. Richard E. Olson is thus the only veteran incumbent up for reelection, and he is being vigorously challenged in the Area 1 race by Sherry L. Baum.

Baum, who is retiring from the Huntington Beach Union High School District governing board, is endorsed by the teachers’ union. She has accused Olson of being “ineffective” and has criticized him for simultaneously running in Tuesday’s election for a post on the Midway City Sanitary District. Olson has responded that he has served in both elected positions for many years without any public complaint or criticism, and that he is running on his record.

Walter Howald is the union’s candidate to succeed Rodda for the Area 5 trustee seat. He is opposed by David A. Post and John Spencer Crump.

The other union-versus-incumbents battles are in Tustin and the Huntington Beach area. In the Tustin Unified School District, the teachers’ union hopes to elect two union-backed candidates, Jane Bauer and Gloria Tuchman, and to oust incumbents Dorothy T. Ralston and Dr. Edward H. Boseker. A fifth candidate, Jim McBride, will be on the ballot but he has officially withdrawn.

6-Day Teachers’ Strike

The Tustin teachers in early October went on a six-day strike, charging that the incumbent board was obstinate in negotiating a new contract. The teachers’ last contract expired in July, 1984.

In the Huntington Beach Union High School District, a dispute over an unresolved teachers’ contract also triggered the teachers’ union move to try to elect a new board majority. The union has three candidates, running as a slate, for the five-member board. They are Jerry L. Sullivan, Bonnie P. Castrey and David K. Warfield. The only incumbent seeking reelection is Stephen H. Smith.

Voters in the district, which includes Huntington Beach, Fountain Valley and Westminster, will elect three board members. The other candidates in the race are Robert Ernest Gerard, George A. Hanna, Robert Osborne (a write-in candidate) and Maxwell N. Sudakow.