LOCAL ELECTIONS : Compton Election : Incumbents Face Chorus of Critics

The mayor and two incumbent councilmen face 14 challengers in Tuesday’s municipal election, a chorus of critics who claim that the incumbents have not done enough to battle gangs and drugs in the city.

Some challengers also charge that developers wield too much influence at City Hall, and have been given overly generous financial incentives.

The voters “perceive a lot of corruption in the government. . . . They feel that the public officials are captive to those developers,” said E. Boyd (Chuck) Esters Jr., one of four challengers to Mayor Walter R. Tucker, who is seeking a third term.

Benjamin Holifield, one of seven candidates trying to unseat Councilman Robert L. Adams, said, “Compton will not go anywhere until we clean up this madness of crime and drugs first.”

Vehement Foe

“We can’t have four more years like this,” said Patricia Moore, who is trying again to oust Councilman Floyd A. James, who defeated her four years ago in a bitter campaign.

The mayor, Adams and James have been defending the city’s redevelopment efforts, saying the new hotel and convention center, the downtown shopping area and other projects the city has helped finance will bring jobs, tax revenue and renewed civic pride.

“People realize what we have been doing to rebuild a city that is 100 years old and (had a) vacuum that was created after the Watts riots,” Tucker said.

23 Candidates in All

It is not easy, the incumbents say, to find developers willing to invest in the city, thus it is necessary to offer financial incentives.

Tucker said that in the area of crime control, Compton became the first city in the state to ban the sale or possession of semiautomatic assault rifles.

In all, 23 candidates are seeking election Tuesday. Also to be decided are races for city clerk, city attorney and city treasurer. In all three cases, incumbents are running against one challenger.

Saul E. Lankster, a florist, is trying to oust City Clerk Charles Davis. City Atty. Wesley Fenderson Jr. is being challenged by Frank E. Bazadier, former head of the Legal Aid office in Compton. Treasurer Wesley Sanders Jr. is being challenged by Earnest J. Spears, head of the Compton Chamber of Commerce.

Candidates who win more than 50% of the vote will be elected. Otherwise, the top two vote-getters would be forced into a runoff election.

Hotel the Biggest Target

The $30-million hotel and convention center, linchpin in the city’s redevelopment plans, has become the biggest target for the challengers, who complain that work has stalled too many times and that the city has invested too much money in a project that was to be built with private funds.

“Carson took five or six years to build theirs,” Tucker said. “Cerritos doesn’t have a hotel. Great work requires great trouble and requires patience.”

If developers and others who have benefited from the city’s redevelopment projects are bankrolling the incumbents’ campaigns, as they have in past elections, voters may not know about it until after the election. Neither Tucker, Adams nor James met deadlines required by state law for filing their campaign contribution and spending reports. All three said they had been too busy.

The reports were due April 6. Toward the end of last week the incumbents’ reports, as well as those of some challengers, had not been filed.

Other Major Issues

While the state of the city and the cost of redevelopment are among the most hotly debated issues, the election is marked by two other issues as well.

There is a challenge to the predominantly black political power structure from the city’s increasingly vocal Latino population. And the Moore-James contest is a replay of a bitter contest four years ago.

Moore, 40, came close to defeating James four years ago, but lost in a runoff election. James, 48, was subsequently indicted for election fraud on charges that he persuaded people to vote for him by giving them record albums of a Rev. Jesse Jackson speech.

In a plea agreement with prosecutors, the felony charge was dropped and James pleaded no contest to a lesser charge that he had sent out a last-minute mailer saying Moore had been disqualified from running for office. He was ordered to pay a $15,000-fine, perform 80 hours of community service and was put on probation for three years.

Legal Troubles Cited

Moore is replaying James’ legal troubles in a hard-hitting campaign mailer that depicts an array of news headlines and clippings about the case.

In a recent interview, Moore said it is ironic that James heads a city task force on crime.

“Floyd James should have gone to jail and been convicted of a felony because it was conspiracy,” Moore said of the record album scheme. “It was planned and executed. He got off. How do you turn to these kids and say crime doesn’t pay?”

James says he does not think the voters believe that he was trying to exchange record albums for votes four years ago, and says he expects to be returned to office Tuesday without a runoff.

Moore also is pressing the incumbent on development issues. James, she says, has been the most vocal supporter of development interests. He insists, however, that the city will reap big benefits from the economic development that the council has promoted.

Crackdown on Crime

“If most of the candidates were on the council, they would support the hotel,” James said. “They would understand that no developer would come to the city before this. The only way the developer would come in is if we would participate with him.”

James insists, too, that the city is making heroic efforts to stem drug trafficking and gang activity. “We’re beginning to clamp down on rock cocaine,” James said. “We’ve been successful in closing the drug houses. We’ve closed over 52 drug houses that we’ve just boarded up.”

James’ attacks on Moore have centered on a question of residency. She owns a house that is outside the 2nd District in which she and James are competing for election. James, in a mailer, claims that the house is her residence. Moore says she rents a home inside the district, and her daughter lives in the house outside the district.

In addition to Moore, a U.S. Census Bureau outreach specialist and former aide to Rep. Mervyn Dymally (D-Compton), two other candidates are running against James. They are Harry Henderson, former supervisor of the Compton Police Department’s automotive section, and Leon C. Polk, a security guard.

3rd District Race

Adams, a 12-year veteran of the council, said at the opening of the campaign that he expected to be forced into a runoff in the 3rd District with Bernice Woods, a trustee of the Compton Unified School District. This week Adams was predicting that he would win without a runoff, but political observers were saying his support has ebbed in recent years.

“Most of the people in the community don’t want him there,” said one challenger, Alfonso Benson, a city planning commissioner. “He’s been there 12 years and people want a change.”

Fred Cressel, a local businessman who helped defeat a measure that would have given the city a full-time mayor, is challenging Adams for the second time, having been defeated four years ago. The voters, Cressel said, are ready this year to replace Adams. The councilman, according to Cressel, insulted many voters at one campaign forum by saying that he was sick and tired of people complaining about the way the council is running the city.

“He said if they don’t like it, there are 80-something cities in Los Angeles (County) if they want to move,” Cressel said. “I think it’s simpler to move him.”

Latino Challenger

Another challenger, Martin D. Chavez, is seeking to become the first Latino to be elected to the council. He is an affirmative action specialist for the Los Angeles County Department of Water and Power. Chavez and his supporters are working to mount a large Latino turnout that will persuade city officials to address Latino demands for more public-sector jobs and more bilingual city services.

With only about 1,800 of the more than 30,000 Latino residents registered to vote, however, Chavez would have to get a large Latino turnout to qualify for a runoff. He is heartened, he said, by the response he has been getting in the past week from black and Samoan voters.

“There is an anti-incumbent sentiment,” he said. “They’ve been in office so long and a lot of the people feel they need new directions, a new thinking process on that council.”

Others running against Adams are Juanas S. Moten, a retired automotive mechanic, and the Rev. Walter Goodin, 41-year-old pastor of Faith Chapel Baptist Church in Los Angeles.

Strongest Challenger

Esters, son of a prominent clergyman, in Compton is given the best chance of making a strong showing against Tucker. Esters’ father is E. Boyd Esters Sr., pastor of the Community Baptist Church for about 30 years.

“I think the people believe the city has deteriorated so badly under his watch,” Esters said by way of explaining why he believes Tucker, a 64-year-old dentist, will be defeated.

Esters, 37, recently returned to Compton to run a transportation business after several years in public administration. He also worked for the Democratic National Committee in Washington, D.C. He said his campaign has spent about $17,000.

Esters said residents have lost confidence in their Police Department, and he wants to hire an outside management consultant to study the department in an effort to raise its effectiveness and its response time.

Also running against Tucker is Royce Esters, 51, an accountant and former chairman of the city’s crime task force. He is no relation to Chuck Esters. Other candidates are Omar Bradley, 30, an English teacher at Lynwood High School, and the Rev. Forrest Smith, 44, former head of the Dove Outreach Christian Center.