Assembly Bid Enlivens Bellflower Council Race

Councilman Ray O’Neal’s decision to seek an Assembly seat at the same time he is seeking reelection to the City Council has given two other incumbents--who are also seeking reelection--ammunition to fire at their colleague.

Meanwhile, most of the six challengers who have lined up to run in the April 8 election are aiming their shots at a number of council decisions--from the sale of a city-owned theater to the way the city decided to legalize bingo.

Three of the council’s five slots will be decided in the balloting. Council members receive $406.25 a month.

O’Neal, seeking his second four-year term on the council, announced earlier this month that he would run for the Assembly seat being vacated by Speaker Pro Tem Frank Vicencia (D-Bellflower). The primary for the legislative seat will be held June 3, with the general election in November.

Mayor James Earle Christo and Councilman John Ansdell, who are also seeking second terms on the council, said O’Neal’s decision to seek higher office at the same time he runs for reelection is unfair to Bellflower voters, and potentially costly.

If O’Neal were reelected to the council and then elected to the Assembly, the council would have the choice of either appointing his replacement or holding a special election. Christo said he would be opposed to appointment because “voters should be allowed to speak.” But, he said, a special election to fill the vacancy would cost between $35,000 and $50,000.

Ansdell, who was also critical of O’Neal’s political plans, said he did not know why O’Neal was seeking the Assembly seat.

“I don’t know what he is trying to do. Maybe it is a publicity stunt. He is just trying to get his name before the voters,” said Ansdell, 66, the owner of A and D Upholstering.

O’Neal, a 48-year-old industrial engineer at Northrop Advanced Systems Division in Pico Rivera, said he did not see problems with seeking the two positions.

“I look at this (running for the Assembly) as an opportunity to advance,” he said.

O’Neal has left the door open to pull out of the Assembly race. His decision would rest partially, he said, on the results of a recent telephone poll that campaign volunteers conducted among randomly selected voters. O’Neal said the results have not been compiled yet.

Christo, O’Neal and Ansdell were elected in April, 1982, on a slate opposed to a redevelopment plan that included all of the city’s commercial and business district and parts of most residential areas.

Once in office, Christo and Ansdell pushed for and were successful in getting an ordinance passed by voters that requires voter approval before a redevelopment agency can be formed in the city of 57,000. O’Neal supported the ordinance.

However, Christo and Ansdell accuse O’Neal of changing sides on other issues after the election.

“He votes against everything we support,” Ansdell said.

As an example, Ansdell and Christo said they support the city’s transit system, known as The Bus, which is funded through money from Proposition A, the half-cent county sales tax for transit projects. The city has received nearly $2 million in transit funds since the program took effect in 1982.

O’Neal said he opposes The Bus “because I never see anybody riding it.” (Between Nov. 4, when The Bus started operating, and Feb. 22, there have been nearly 15,000 passengers, according to statistics complied by the Bellflower city staff.) O’Neal said he would like to see the funds returned to the county, which could use the money to supplement and reduce RTD bus fares countywide.

As a result of their disagreements with O’Neal, Christo and Ansdell have endorsed one of the nine challengers, LaVerne Smith. Smith, who was Christo’s treasurer during the 1982 campaign, has endorsed Christo and Ansdell.

“O’Neal’s signal that he was running for two offices swayed me to support a third candidate. I don’t think it’s fair to the voters for him to run for both offices,” said Christo, owner of Earle’s Tuxedo Rentals. Christo, who was 75 when elected in 1982, will not discuss his age. He says it is not an issue. The position of mayor is an honorary one and selection is made annually by fellow council members.

Smith, 49, said she is running because she believes the council can “use a woman’s point of view.” If elected, Smith said, she would pursue construction of more housing for senior citizens. She said she would also like to see a safer and cleaner city.

Smith is a real estate counselor for Golden West Realtors in Lakewood, and president of Chart Masters Printing Corp. of Downey, which she runs with her husband, Leo.

The other challengers have stayed out of the fray over O’Neal’s political ambitions. But they have drawn up their own lists of complaints about the council.

For instance, Ralph Ball, 59, said he believes the three incumbents have done “an extremely poor job of conducting city business.”

Ball, who was an unsuccessful council candidate in 1982 when he also ran on an anti-redevelopment plank, has been a city planning commissioner for almost two years. He runs a computer consulting firm and product development company, Ralph Ball’s Enterprises.

He cites the way the council handled the sale of the downtown Holiday Theater. The theater was sold to the Hosanna Chapel in August, 1984, for $175,000. The Rev. Garry Ansdell, the son of Councilman Ansdell, is pastor of the church.

Ball said the city did not advertise the sale of the theater long enough and it was sold for far less than the advertised price of $250,000.

Christo countered that the city had only two bids, both for $175,000, but the church was the only one to agree to submit the 10% down payment asked by the city.

Councilman Ansdell said he always abstained from voting on matters involving the church because of the potential conflict of interest. On the sale of the church, the vote was 3-1 with Christo voting yes and O’Neal voting no.

Two other challengers have joined hands in supporting each other after dealing with the council last year in getting legalized bingo for the city. They are Jean A. Englebach, 39, president of the PTA at Bellflower High School, and William Pendleton, 44, president of the Bellflower High School Performing Arts Boosters Club.

Englebach, Pendleton and others approached the City Council last year claiming that illegal bingo games were being allowed and asking the city to make the game legal so nonprofit organizations could raise money.

Council Reversal

At first the council decided to put the bingo question on the ballot this spring. But when the Sheriff’s Department began warning that it would enforce the no-bingo ordinance, the council reversed itself and legalized bingo in October.

“It was stupid the way the council handled the situation. The ordinance should have been passed years ago. The issue could have been resolved easily,” Englebach said.

Besides the bingo issue, Englebach said she is concerned about ridership on The Bus.

The Bus “is empty the times I’ve observed it,” said Englebach, who is vice president of Englebach Enterprises, a small computer-consulting firm in the city.

Pendleton, 44, a line crew supervisor for Southern California Edison, said he is not “pushing a particular issue” in the campaign.

“I’m telling voters I can serve them. I can be objective. I can work well with the council, the city staff and other departments of the city,” Pendleton said.

Another candidate in the field is an ex-council veteran Ken Cleveland, 53, who served for eight years before he was defeated in 1978. He said he is running again “because I feel I have something to contribute. I’m not running because I have an ax to grind with anyone.”

Need for Sales Taxes Cited

“We need to do something to increase our sales taxes. We need to work to attract new business to the city,” said Cleveland, who is a partner in both Hammond Lumber Co. and Cleveland Development Co., a developer of single-family residences.

He said he was concerned that the city has lost two automobile dealerships in the last several years. Norm Reeves Honda left in September, 1983, and Pearce Brothers Buick (now Buick Mart) left in August, 1984. Both went to the nearby Cerritos Auto Square.

Roger Kelly, 41, said he is running because he believes the city’s development lacks direction.

“There is no conformity. You’ll find a motel on one corner, a house on another and a body shop all in the same place,” said Kelly, a real estate broker and developer. He owns Realty World Mid-Cities in Bellflower. He has been a city parks and recreation commissioner for four years.

Candidates said they have not held fund-raisers, but most said they will be holding events within a few weeks. Most said they believe it would take between $2,000 and $10,000 to run a campaign successfully.