Schaefer Shifts Support to Developers, Critics Charge : Politics: The Ventura supervisor, who is seeking reelection, began as a controlled-growth advocate. But half her contributions are now from developers.

One of Madge Schaefer’s earliest causes was fighting the now-popular Oaks Mall in Thousand Oaks, a grass-roots effort that failed but helped launch her political career and reputation as a tough advocate for controlled development.

Nearly two decades later, as the Ventura County supervisor embarks on a reelection campaign, public records show that well over half the money she raised in the past two years comes from the building and land-development industries--contributions that critics say represent a straying from the ranks of her early allies.

“I found Madge Schaefer pro-developer oriented,” said John Baloff, a North Ranch resident and retired civil engineer for the city of Berkeley who last fall unsuccessfully opposed a shopping center in the unincorporated community of Oak Park. “She doesn’t really care what the people say. She wouldn’t listen.”

Schaefer’s campaign-contribution statements show she has received about $44,000 since January, 1988, from land developers, real estate agents, contractors and their attorneys--about 62% of the $71,000 she raised during that two-year period. She reports a current cash fund of about $38,500.

As she announced her plans last week to seek a second term on the Board of Supervisors, the fiery Schaefer maintained that her integrity and environmental sympathies are intact--as do a host of admirers who include Joseph Edmiston, administrator of the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, and Rorie Skei, the immediate past chairman of the conservancy’s board.

“You’ll know when I’m on the take because I’ll be dragging a chinchilla coat through the Safeway, baby, and the Rolls-Royce will be waiting outside,” Schaefer declared in response to questions about her fund-raisers.

“I’m really offended by it--that people think I’m for sale, and I’m not. Those who are leveling the criticism are the ones who haven’t made any contributions of any kind. The only thing they’ve contributed is their criticism,” she said.

And yet, some of her present critics were early supporters who were members of neighborhood groups and homeowner organizations that hoped to stem the seemingly inexorable tide of development spreading northward from Los Angeles County.

“I feel very disappointed and betrayed,” said one homeowner activist who asked to remain anonymous. When Schaefer was on the Thousand Oaks City Council, “she identified herself with environmentalists. Yet on the Board of Supervisors she has, to my way of thinking, proved otherwise. She’s regarded among environmentalists here as a turncoat.”

But she also has staunch defenders in the environmentalist ranks, like Skei, who is also chairman of the board for the Conejo Open Space Conservation Agency.

“She’s a very smart cookie, and I think her integrity is beyond reproach,” Skei said. “I think she’s very capable of taking money from developers and then saying, ‘Sorry, no deal.’ ”

Schaefer has no competition for the county’s second-district seat, which includes the eastern end of the county and portions along the coast as far north as Port Hueneme. Thousand Oaks Councilman Frank Schillo acknowledged last week that he was thinking of running against her in the Republican primary in June, but said he has yet to make up his mind.

The other Ventura County supervisor up for reelection this year, James Dougherty of Simi Valley, reports a cash fund of about $93,600, most of it left over from his 1986 campaign--during which he also accepted a number of developers’ contributions, according to public records.

Campaign contributions from the building industry are nothing new in Southern California, and Schaefer’s contributions are modest compared with politicians elsewhere. Los Angeles County Supervisor Mike Antonovich, for example, reported receiving in a recent three-year period more than $880,000 in contributions from the building industry, or 48% of the total $1.8 million he received during that period.

But in Ventura County, once a primarily agricultural area that is urbanizing rapidly, Schaefer’s apparent ease among high-power developers has provoked skepticism among critics and supporters alike.

Schaefer has hosted two fund-raisers in the past two years, and the locations she chose for the events raised eyebrows among some constituents.

In April, 1988, Schaefer had a fund-raiser at the Hidden Valley horse farm of developer David Murdock, whose luxury residential project at Lake Sherwood, southwest of Thousand Oaks, still requires a series of zoning and general plan amendments by the Board of Supervisors. Schaefer voted for approval of the project in 1987.

Campaign reports show Schaefer paid more than $5,000 for the use of Murdock’s farm, and she asserted last week that no aspect of the brunch and horse show was a gift from the developer. Nevertheless, detractors say the location was inappropriate since Murdock has business before the Board of Supervisors, and Schaefer has since been criticized as being too close to the developer and horse breeder.

During the event, Murdock donated a pony to Schaefer’s fund-raising effort. The horse is reported in Schaefer’s campaign statements as a $500 in-kind donation. It was purchased during an auction for $4,000 by Michal Bowman, the wife of Westlake Village developer Joseph Bowman. Bowman, who owns Wilma Pacific Inc., also gave Schaefer $1,000.

A fund-raiser last June was held at the Tower Club in Oxnard, whose owner, Martin Smith, was described by Schaefer as one of the biggest landowners in the county. Schaefer’s campaign reports show that she paid nearly $3,000 for the club’s use.

Others who have contributed to the Friends of Madge Schaefer committee in the past two years are the Lang Ranch Co. ($490), First City Holdings Inc. ($2,000), Courtly Homes ($1,110), Jordan Ranch developers Peter Kyros Jr. and Fredric Maas ($730), Pardee Construction ($240), the H.F. Ahmanson Co. ($2,000), Shapell Industries ($1,000), David Murdock ($1,500), the Horizons Group ($1,500), and Laurence-Hovenier Inc. contractors ($2,500).

R.P. Richards Inc., a Goleta contractor that has been hired for several major jobs for the county, gave Schaefer $6,000 in 1988.

After a charity ball at Murdock’s Lake Sherwood clubhouse last December, society coverage of the event in a Thousand Oaks newspaper included a photograph of a smiling Schaefer at Murdock’s side.

“She’s not at my parties or the people’s parties,” Baloff said, adding:

“She’s a smart, tough politician. But I have not found her to be able to talk to me about density, about zoning, about the environment. Her job is to determine what is best for the public and the developer. I find she does what is best for the developer.”

Edmiston said he disagreed with Schaefer’s support of Murdock’s project, which he opposed not only because it involved extensive grading but also because it turned Lake Sherwood, once a popular public recreation spot, into a privately owned site for the exclusive use of area residents.

Still, Edmiston made a $250 contribution to Schaefer’s campaign committee last year and said that in general, “she has been a great help to us. . . . I’d say we were lucky to have someone like her in politics.”

Skei agreed, suggesting that Schaefer attracts criticism more for her acerbic style than her voting record.

But a Westlake Village homeowners’ representative said he and other residents at the eastern end of the county were deeply disappointed when Schaefer voted in favor of conducting a combined environmental impact report (EIR) for the proposed Jordan and Ahmanson ranch projects, instead of rejecting the proposals outright.

If approved, the two projects would add 3,000 homes, two golf courses and two commercial centers to an area of the county that is largely undeveloped and flanks Cheseboro State Park. They would also increase traffic and the burden on municipal services in nearby Los Angeles County.

The environmental studies are expected to be released this spring, and public hearings concerning their results should take place in the summer and fall, coinciding with Schaefer’s reelection campaign.

“The EIR was approved by a 3-2 vote, and she was instrumental in getting the EIR approved. She took the initiative and argued for it. She seems to take more of a developer’s and builder’s side than she does the homeowners’,” the Westlake Village resident said.

Schaefer said last week that “anyone who makes up their mind before becoming thoroughly informed is performing a disservice.”

Edmiston agreed.

“You can’t criticize someone for saying, ‘Let’s see what the environmental impacts are,’ ” Edmiston said. “I don’t think there’s a single politician who’d have a 100% voting record. You have to look at the overall situation.”