Town Activist on Brink of Controversy : Acton: The outspoken slow-growth advocate has taken another unpopular stand by purchasing the local newspaper.

Meet Citizen Brink.

A heavyset bulldog of a man, Charles Brink returned three years ago to his hometown of Acton, formerly a rough-and-tumble mining community set in a steamy mountainous bowl between the Antelope and Santa Clarita valleys.

Since then, Brink, 51, has fought with developers and has gotten himself arrested for allegedly stealing real estate signs. He was accused by rivals of swiping ballots for the Town Council election, though the accusations never led to criminal charges. He even had the temerity to engineer the election of a dog named Serena as queen of the annual Splash Dance fund-raiser, thus snubbing the wife of one of the town’s leaders.

Critics have coined a term for what they see as his particular brand of anti-development populism: Brinkism.

Last week, Brinkism took a new form when he purchased the money-losing Vanguard News for $15,000. Brink said he wanted only to preserve Acton’s independent voice. But from the air-conditioned refuge of the 49er Saloon to the new estates set like Scottish castles atop the bluffs around town, people are scratching their heads and asking themselves, “What is he up to now?”

“Why is he here, tearing this town apart?” asked Peggy Fate, a critic of Brink who lost out to Serena in the Splash Dance voting.

Several people expressed fears that Brink, the operations manager for an accounting firm in the San Fernando Valley, will turn the paper into a mouthpiece for his slow-growth philosophy.

When real estate agents heard about the sale, the paper was swamped with calls from brokers asking to cancel their ads. Vince Etheredge, the former publisher of the Vanguard, said he had to do some fast talking to persuade the advertisers that Brink would have nothing to do with an advertising insert, the Trading Post, which appears inside the newspaper. Etheredge retained ownership of the Trading Post.

Fred Fate, Peggy’s husband and a retired sheriff’s deputy who has had several run-ins with Brink, was not consoled by that news.

“He will now have a tool where he will be able to lambaste, slander and libel everyone in town,” he said.

Critics wonder whether Brink has a conflict of interest, since he serves on the Town Council, an advisory body to the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.

“Our idea of a newspaper is a free press,” said Richard Grzesiak, a Chamber of Commerce official who owns Acton Pools and Spas. “But if you slant the entire paper, it’s not a free press. He says he won’t do that, but the holdup man doesn’t say he’s going to hold you up before he does it either.”

Brink argues mildly that people should not be worried. Anything he writes as an opinion will be labeled that way, he said. But he admits that he hopes to shake up the town with some good old-fashioned journalism.

“It’s going to be interesting. I’m thinking it will be like the little New Hampshire papers you read about.”

But Acton seems to have little in common with New Hampshire. Acton is one of the older desert communities, with roots going back 100 years. Some of the largest gold strikes in Southern California were made in its Governor mine. The community still retains the feel of a mining outpost; the center of town is a complex of wood-frame buildings that resembles a set lifted from a John Ford film.

The frontier can still seem close at hand when residents retell stories such as the one about the motorcycle gang known as the Vagos that rode into town one day in the ‘70s. The gang was armed, but so were the folks of Acton, and before the shooting had subsided outside the 49er, sheriff’s deputies from as far away as Castaic swarmed into town. “We had Vagos hiding under trees, rocks, everything else,” Fate recalled.

In recent years, however, the population has grown from 2,200 to as much as 8,000, according to Grzesiak, as refugees from Los Angeles began moving there and buying acreage on the hillsides. The growth has been greeted by some with pleasure, because it means more money flowing into town. But others see the proliferation of for-sale signs on Crown Valley Road as a dangerous sign of spreading suburbia.

Brink grew up in Acton and his mother still lives on a large tract of land across California 14 in the hills. Residents say he suddenly showed up three years ago after a long absence. When he saw what was happening to his hometown, he thought to himself that he had two choices.

“I could build a 100-foot fence around me and ignore the community,” he said. Or he could get involved. He got involved, and critics and supporters agree that the town hasn’t been the same since.

He stalked the halls of county government, testifying at hearings and ferreting out information about proposed developments around Acton. “He works so hard for that community,” said Terry Kaldhusdal, 30, the editor of the Vanguard News until Etheredge was forced to lay him off several weeks ago because of the recession.

Brink’s name was frequently in the news columns because he showed up for every governmental meeting, whether it was the planning commission or the school board.

“People would ask why I kept printing Chuck Brink’s name,” Kaldhusdal said. “Who am I supposed to quote? He was the only one there.”

But Brink’s activism also led him into conflict. In October, 1990, the district attorney’s office filed felony and misdemeanor conspiracy and theft charges against him and fellow Town Council member Joel Levy, alleging that the two men stole or vandalized “open house” real estate signs worth $3,500.

At the time, Brink said he was acting to enforce a higher law because the signs were a blight on the community. “If a vigilante enforces the law, they have a right to do it,” he said.

Conspiracy and theft charges are still pending against Brink, who said he has already faxed a confession to prosecutors.

If the case goes to trial, it seems likely that the Fates will be witnesses against Brink, because they say they witnessed two of the thefts. The Fates are infuriated that some people refer lightly to the case as the “sign caper.”

“Between the two of them,” Peggy Fate said of Brink and Levy, “they have made the Acton Town Council a joke.”

It only takes a few minutes of conversation to discover that the Fates and Brink clearly don’t think well of each other. Part of it may be traced to temperament. The Fates are both retired from law enforcement and respect the will of the majority, while Brink is an individualist who seems to enjoy tweaking the Establishment.

“What Chuck’s problem is is he has no respect for authority,” Fred Fate said.

Brink attributes the conflict to his belief that before his return to town the Fates were acknowledged leaders in town.

“They felt my prominence in the community was a threat,” Brink said. “He felt he and his wife were the king and queen of Acton.”

Brink takes credit for being part of the scheme that led to Serena’s selection as queen of the Splash Dance, a get-together in front of Grzesiak’s pool store to raise money for charity. People pay to cast votes for their favorites.

The Fates showed up last year in turn-of-the-century bathing suits and it was thought by many people that they would win the contest.

But Brink said he and his friends donated enough money to make the dog queen and another man the king.

“It was a joke. He does not have a sense of humor,” Brink said of Fred Fate.

Not true, Peggy Fate said. “That doesn’t bother me. A group of people assumed Fred and I would be the king and queen. Apparently, Chuck manipulated the votes.”

It was not the first time that the Fates and Brink argued over an election.

The Fates said that Brink stole a bag of ballots for the first Town Council election three years ago and was eventually arrested. Brink denies the accusation, saying he turned over the ballots to the president of the council. He says he was just trying to protect the sanctity of the election and make sure there was no cheating by his rivals.

What makes people act up like this? “It’s the heat and the wind,” Fred Fate said philosophically, referring to the extreme climatic conditions on the high desert.

At the center of the struggle for the hearts and minds of Acton is a little tabloid paper that puts stories about a senior citizen barbecue on the front page and features a column by Pack-Mule Parker. “Howdy my ole partners and buckaroos out there,” is how he began a recent epistle.

The paper was started 10 years ago by Etheredge, whose mother, Jean, became the advertising manager and was credited by some people with keeping the paper in the black. On May 23, 1990, Norma Jean Etheredge, 49, was killed by her estranged 68-year-old husband, George, in front of the 49er. He committed suicide shortly afterward.

The story circulating around town was that Jean, who sang country-Western music for private parties, was trying to get out of the marriage and George decided that if he couldn’t have her, nobody else could either.

Vince Etheredge denied reports that his mother’s death had anything to do with his decision to sell out to Brink. “The more pressing issue was economics,” said Etheredge, 30, who is night manager at an Alpha Beta store in Sepulveda.

He said he was surprised that Brink was willing to buy the part of the paper that consistently loses money.

“I’m not getting into it to make a profit,” Brink said.