MOORPARK : 3 Seek to Become 1st Elected Mayor

Two Moorpark City Council members and a former parks and recreation commissioner have entered the race to become the city’s first elected mayor.

Councilmen Clint Harper and Paul Lawrason filed papers last week for the two-year post, City Clerk Lilly Kellerman said. Both men served stints as mayor when the post was filled by a vote of the council.

Harper, 43, was elected to the council in 1986. He is a physics instructor at Moorpark College.

Lawrason, 61, was elected to the council in 1988 and has two years left in his term. He has been a contracts and pricing director for Teleflex Control Systems in Oxnard for two years.

Tom Wheeler, 45, an assistant vice president of a Simi Valley survey and auditing services firm, served as chairman and vice chairman of the Moorpark Parks and Recreation Commission during his two-year term.

The three candidates are expected to run high-profile campaigns that will focus on whether the city of about 27,000 should continue to experience a high rate of growth--4.2% last year.