ELECTIONS DIAMOND BAR : Year-Old City Faces Its 2nd Council Vote

Just one year after voters overwhelmingly approved cityhood and elected their first City Council, candidates are at it again, canvassing neighborhoods and shopping centers.

This year, with the cityhood debate settled, nine candidates running for three council seats are promising everything from traffic signals to narcotics patrols to limits on apartment and condominium construction in Los Angeles County’s newest city.

The candidates include two incumbents, John Forbing and Gary Werner, and challengers Gregory Gaffney, Cleve Holifield, Jay Kim, Thomas Ortiz, Jim Paul, Garry Stitt and Bryan Thomas.

Forbing, 47, said the council has done a “good job in the first year. I feel I’m more qualified now than when voters first elected me to the council.”

Forbing, an agent for the State Farm Insurance Cos. in Pomona and a former board member for the Walnut Valley Unified School District, pointed to Diamond Bar’s budget, which has a $750,000 surplus for the 1989-90 fiscal year, as one indication that the council has exercised good local government while keeping costs at a minimum.

That was accomplished, he emphasized, even though the city has been operating without $1.2 million in property taxes. Because of a technicality related to the date of its incorporation, the city is barred from receiving property tax revenues during fiscal year 1989-90. The Legislature is considering a bill that would give Diamond Bar the money.

Forbing is going after votes from people who don’t normally turn out for City Council races. Last year, 38.8% of 24,500 registered voters participated in Diamond Bar’s election. This year, telephoning residents at random, Forbing’s campaign committee learned that “many didn’t even know there was an election coming up,” he said. Forbing said he is sending those people absentee ballots.

Werner, 39, former head of the city’s Incorporation Committee, said: “The cityhood issue is now behind us. Now it’s a matter of forming a strong local government.”

Werner, owner of Community Development Consulting Services, said the City Council must expedite street and freeway improvements that will bring sound commercial development to Diamond Bar. In addition, he said, the city should increase its efforts to crack down on drug traffic and gangs.

Werner, who finished third in the 1989 election, is planning to quadruple his campaign war chest this year. His goal is to spend $17,000, compared with $4,000 for his first council bid. Forbing is budgeting $12,000, compared with the $10,700 he spent last year.

“I’ve got more to protect this time,” Werner said.

Gaffney, 27, a data-base administrator at AST Research Inc. in Irvine, said his main concern is crime, especially car thefts.

“The rate is going up tremendously,” he said. Gaffney, who is vice president of the Diamond Bar Improvement Assn., said he would also encourage the formation of additional neighborhood watch programs. Gaffney finished 19th in the council election last March.

Gaffney criticized Councilmen Paul Horcher and Gary Miller, who have sought higher office, saying: “We need some individuals who are going to be here for the long haul.”

Miller, who lost a special election to fill the state Senate seat vacated by the resignation of William Campbell (R-Hacienda Heights), is not running for reelection. Horcher, whose council term expires in 1992, is running for the Assembly seat of Frank Hill (R-Whittier), the Republican nominee for Campbell’s seat.

While other candidates have been hesitant to openly criticize city government, Holifield, 56, strongly objects to the council’s ousting of Horcher from his post as mayor pro tem. Horcher was removed after a falling-out with Miller during the state Senate race. Horcher, who was supporting Hill in the race, had accused Miller of conflict-of-interest violations.

Holifield, a project engineer for General Dynamics Corp. in Pomona, also is running for the second time. He said a good track record of community service has won him the support of his colleagues.

He was on Diamond Bar’s Municipal Advisory Council from 1984 to 1989 and was chairman four years. In 1989, he ran unsuccessfully for the school board in the Pomona Unified School District.

Last year, Holifield received the seventh-highest number of votes and spent only $400--”the most votes for the dollar,” he said. This time, he has set a ceiling of $3,000 for campaign expenditures.

Kim, 50, is on the other end of the spectrum when it comes to campaign spending. He said he has budgeted $25,000, including $10,000 of his own money.

Kim, owner of Diamond Bar-based Jaykim Engineers Inc., said his extensive background in city planning and traffic issues, including serving as city engineer and traffic engineer in several cities, would benefit Diamond Bar.

If elected, Kim said, his top priority would be construction of the Tonner Canyon Parkway, proposed to run north-south through Orange and San Bernardino counties. The road, part of the settlement of a suit between San Bernardino and Diamond Bar, is expected to siphon off traffic from Grand Avenue.

Kim said he would support the establishment of joint benefit assessment districts to pay for the road, though some residents are against that financing. Such districts pay for public works projects by assessing developers or homeowners. “That’s what people are upset about,” he said, “but I don’t think the city has any choice.”

Ortiz, 55, a retired Santa Ana police officer and chairman of Diamond Bar’s Traffic and Transportation Committee, said each council member “should have a different personality, so you have five different ways of thinking.”

Ortiz, who ran for the council last year, said he wants to limit the apartments and condominiums in Diamond Bar and to increase the number of sheriff’s patrols.

“I don’t want to see graffiti, gangs and prostitution,” he said. “I want safety for everyone who lives in Diamond Bar.”

Ortiz’s largest donation comes from his daughter’s and son-in-law’s employer, Carl N. Karcher, chairman of Carl Karcher Enterprises, which owns Carl’s Jr. restaurants. Karcher contributed $1,000 to the campaign. Ortiz said he plans to spend $5,000.

Paul, 49, is campaigning on a platform of “no special interests.” The retired Los Angeles County paramedic said he is not soliciting contributions and has even turned down offers by two local businesses to give money to his campaign.

Paul also said he strongly supports a bill submitted by Rep. David Dreier (R-La Verne) that would redraw U.S. postal boundaries so that cities wouldn’t have to share ZIP codes. Currently, residents and businesses in northwest Diamond Bar, including Paul, share the 91789 ZIP code with Walnut and must use a Walnut mailing address.

City officials, learning that sales tax revenue from those businesses was accidentally diverted to Walnut, lobbied Dreier to submit legislation to rectify the situation.

Stitt, 39, a sales specialist for RJR Nabisco Group and a member of Diamond Bar’s Parks and Recreation Commission, said he wants to control the spread of commercial projects in the city.

“I’m not really anti-development,” he said. “It’s just that we have so many Italian places, so many pizza places. We need to take time and maybe just slow the development down. We need a chance to breathe.”

Stitt, a 20-year resident of Diamond Bar, considers himself “a dark-horse candidate” because he isn’t one of the five who ran last year and because he has fewer contacts in the business community than other contenders. “But I’m giving it my best shot.”

Thomas, 21, a senior at Cal Poly Pomona, is probably the least visible candidate.

He said he “started out with a lot of enthusiasm” but was distracted by the demands of a full class schedule and round-the-clock business commitments. He said the only campaigning he’s had time to do is among fellow students, and he won’t be able to make it to any of the five candidate forums.

“Unfortunately, I’ve had to let the campaign slide,” Thomas said in a telephone interview. “I’m kind of bummed about that. It’s been kind of a halfhearted effort.”