Diversity of District 1 Puts 5 in Race to Test : Pasadena: Four say they can help rich and poor alike. One insists the representative should be from the Northwest, where he lives.

For the candidates seeking to fill the District 1 Board of Directors seat to be vacated by 12-year incumbent John Crowley, the March 5 primary election is an exercise in walking a political tightrope.

The district, encompassing the Rose Bowl and surrounding neighborhoods, contains some of the city’s wealthiest residents, in the Linda Vista-Annandale area, and some of the poorest, in Northwest Pasadena.

Thus, residents range from Anglo owners of $500,000 homes, who regularly trek to City Hall to demand limits on hillside building, to black and Latino housing project residents who want jobs, city services and an end to racism. And 65% of the district is, in fact, black, according to the 1980 census.

Faced with this political split and a pledge by black activists to organize their community behind a black candidate, four of the five candidates portray themselves as able to represent the entire district.

One black candidate, Isaac Richard, has taken a different tack, insisting that the District 1 representative should be from the Northwest, where he lives.

Richard, an 18-year Pasadena resident with a master’s degree in business administration from Columbia University, said he views the contest as part of a continuing struggle for minority representation in Pasadena.

During the 1960s and 1970s, black candidates received more votes within the district than their Anglo opponents, but failed to win the seat because they received fewer votes in citywide runoffs.

In 1979, after candidate Lois Richard (no relation), who is black, beat Crowley, who is white, within the district and lost citywide, she joined 13 community groups in a lawsuit against the city. The suit was dropped after the Board of Directors placed the issue of district elections on the ballot and voters approved it in 1980.

Despite the change to district elections, Crowley, the incumbent, continued to win; in 1987, he got 91.7% of the vote.

Now, with Crowley’s decision not to run for a fourth term, Isaac Richard and other black activists are trying to galvanize the district’s black community. It is an uphill task. The Northwest community averaged a 4% turnout in the 1987 election, compared with 28% in Linda Vista.

Nevertheless, Richard contended, “I think it takes a lot of nerve to come from Linda Vista and say, ‘I want to represent King’s Villages (a housing project).’ Until the Northwest community is included in the political loop of this city, none of the other issues will be addressed.”

The other issues, Richard said, are housing, job development, child care and youth recreation programs.

Northwest’s needs are well-known to candidate Nina Chomsky, she said. A 15-year Pasadena resident and longtime community activist, Chomsky cited her work on the city’s Community Development Committee dealing with housing and economic development.

Her time on the city’s Design Commission has prepared her for preserving Linda Vista-Annandale’s neighborhoods, said Chomsky, a lawyer who graduated from USC. “I think I am the only candidate who can deal with everything going on in this district,” she said.

Sally Mosher, another longtime Pasadena resident and activist, also said she will represent the diversity that exists in District 1. “I would hope I’m evaluated on my competence and point of view and not just my skin color or sex,” she said.

Mosher, a lawyer with a degree from USC, believes the city’s handling of finances, its information flow and fairness and accessibility to citizens could be improved.

She believes the building of large homes on small lots is a problem in Linda Vista, along with economic renewal in Northwest Pasadena.

Candidate Nicholas T. Conway prides himself on his participation in economic renewal through the Vermont Slauson Economic Development Corp. The nonprofit group, of which Conway was a board member, built a successful shopping center in South-Central Los Angeles. Conway said he would like to do the same in Northwest Pasadena.

“I am the only candidate running that has successful economic development experience in an urban, ethnically diverse area,” he said.

Conway, an auditor with a degree in public administration from USC, also places high priority on enhancing neighborhoods, making city government work more efficiently and providing youth services.

He touts his participation in the Rose Bowl Aquatic Center and believes recent criticism by the NAACP that blacks were excluded from the center was meant to harm his campaign.

Millie Lee (White) said her political concerns stem from her social work background. Although registered to vote in her maiden name, White, Lee said she is known throughout the Northwest community under her married name, Lee. Because of the registration, however, her ballot listing includes her maiden name parenthetically.

“My issues are the senior citizens who haven’t a voice at City Hall in District 1,” said Lee, who attended Ohio University and is administrator of a drug and alcohol recovery house.

She wants to see a senior coalition created, and also wants to establish a job center and a center for homeless women and children.

“I’m a people’s candidate,” Lee said, adding that her campaign is a grass-roots affair with family members helping out.

If no candidate receives more than 50% of the vote March 5, the two top vote-getters will be in the April 16 runoff.

DISTRICT 1 CANDIDATES

Sally Mosher, 56

Attorney, president of the Pasadena investment firm Oakhill Enterprises

Mosher has been active in the city’s Endowment Advisory Commission, Foothill Area Community Services, the Pasadena Arts Council and the Pasadena Board of Realtors.

Isaac Richard, 33

Housing consultant, Dukes-Dukes & Associates, San Bernardino

Richard served on the city’s Northwest Task Force and is on the recently created Resource Allocation Commission. He belongs to the NAACP, the King’s Villages Tenants Union Organization and the Fair Housing Council of San Gabriel Valley.

Nina Chomsky, 43

Corporate, tax and real estate attorney

Chomsky has served on the Resource Allocation Committee and is on the city Community Development Committee and the Design Commission.

Nicholas T. Conway, 39

Municipal auditor with his own company, ASA Management Consultants

Conway is former president of the Linda Vista-Annandale Homeowners’ Assn. and is on the board of directors of the Amateur Athletic Foundation Rose Bowl Aquatics Center.

Millie Lee (White), 55

Founder and administrator of Faith House, a drug and alcohol recovery house for men in Northwest Pasadena

Lee managed the Pasadena offices of Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley’s 1984 run for governor, Jesse Jackson’s 1988 presidential bid and Michael Zinzun’s 1989 race for the Pasadena Board of Directors.