ELECTIONS : Most School Incumbents Win; Mayor’s Race Close : Cities: Ginny Lambert leads Steve Andersen by eight votes in Hawthorne’s mayoral race, but absentee ballotes are yet to be counted.

Ginny Lambert wonders if eight is enough--but her concern has little to do with family planning.

The Hawthorne councilwoman emerged from her city’s two-way mayoral race Tuesday just eight votes ahead of council colleague Steve Andersen. The two are in for a nervous wait: Election officials plan to tally uncounted absentee ballots starting today.

“Eight, I know, is not an enormous lead,” Lambert said Wednesday, “but all it takes to be a winner is one.”

In all, one mayoralty, 11 city council posts and a city clerk and city treasurer’s seat were at stake in five South Bay cities in Tuesday’s elections. Decisions by no fewer than 10 incumbents to step down ensured wide-open competition for the Hawthorne mayor’s post and nine city council seats in El Segundo, Hawthorne, Hermosa Beach, Rancho Palos Verdes and Rolling Hills Estates.

Also decided Tuesday were four ballot measures in Hermosa Beach, where voters opted to develop the former Biltmore Hotel site, and in El Segundo, where a proposed parcel tax went down to defeat. And voters in the Palos Verdes Peninsula Library District settled a race for two seats on the district’s board of trustees.

Here is a city-by-city look at the outcomes:

RANCHO PALOS VERDES

Not only did two of the three City Council incumbents facing reelection decide not to run, but the resulting six-candidate field became embroiled in a bitter development debate. At issue was whether the city should ease restrictions on development in the Portuguese Bend landslide area.

The topic obviously touched a nerve--voter turnout was an eye-popping 85%. Winning the three council seats were incumbent John McTaggart, 61, and challengers Susan Brooks, 41, and Steven Kuykendall, 44.

All three say they would oppose more construction in the slide area. But they express willingness to look at any proposals--including one by Orange County developer Barry Hon to build a golf course there.

Approval of Hon’s project, they say, would hinge on the developer’s ability to prove the golf course would be geologically safe and benefit the city.

“Everyone has a right to make an application,” Brooks said Wednesday.

Fourth-place finisher Dawn Henry, a more outspoken opponent of development than the winners, suggested Wednesday that the council will now give Hon special treatment.

“Unfortunately, Hon won the election . . . he bought the candidates,” Henry said, referring to the developer’s financing of campaign mailers that criticized her and the other two losing candidates--Kay Bara and Barbara Dye. “This means Hon will have a big influence on city decisions.”

McTaggart said that before the council can tackle development issues, it must deal with a $1.25-million budget deficit.

“We’ve got to get our financial house in order first,” said McTaggart, who was elected to a third term.

Meanwhile, voters in Rancho Palos Verdes and other peninsula cities elected two incumbents and a newcomer to the Palos Verdes Peninsula Library District’s board of trustees.

Incumbents William Glanz, 48, and Robert Rowe, 69, of Rancho Palos Verdes and newcomer Christopher Tara, 37, of Rolling Hills Estates will face an immediate challenge--supervising the $16-million renovation and expansion of the Peninsula Center Branch library.

HAWTHORNE

In the city’s mayoral race, Lambert led Andersen 2,332 votes to 2,324 with all precincts reporting--a difference of just two-tenths of a percentage point.

The tally of uncounted absentee ballots in dozens of municipal races across the county begins today and could continue until Nov. 25, officials with the Los Angeles County registrar-recorder’s office said Wednesday. It is unknown how many of the ballots, if any, were mailed by Hawthorne voters, officials said.

“So far, all we have done is estimate that there are about 6,700 (uncounted ballots) countywide,” said Marcia Ventura, a spokeswoman for the registrar-recorder’s office. “We will begin counting them and probably have our first update on Friday or Monday.”

The contest between Andersen, 49, and Lambert, 59, was started when Mayor Betty Ainsworth decided to step down and run for a council seat.

Lambert raised more than $27,000 and Andersen more than $12,000 as the pair waged an angry campaign. Lambert became the target of last-minute allegations by allies of Andersen that she had violated the state’s open-meeting law and had threatened to seek City Atty. Michael Adamson’s ouster to head off investigation of the matter.

Andersen couldn’t be reached for comment Wednesday, but Lambert said she thought the charges boomeranged.

“I think they (Andersen’s supporters) went too far, and they harmed themselves,” she said. “They made it too unbelievable.”

The contest for Andersen’s and Lambert’s council seats was tranquil by comparison, with Ainsworth, 65, and political newcomer Larry Guidi, 33, leading a six-candidate field.

Ainsworth, with one of the smallest fund-raising totals in the race, viewed her first-place finish as an expression of gratitude from voters.

“I think many people in the city are benefiting from the various programs we have--programs for the handicapped, dial-a-ride (for seniors) or children’s youth programs,” Ainsworth said. “This vote indicates that.”

HERMOSA BEACH

Hermosa Beach voters picked two new council members out of a sprawling 10-candidate field. The winners, both of whom have been commentators on local cable television shows, were Sam Edgerton, 35, a corporate lawyer, and Robert Benz, 34, an engineer known as Burgie on his satirical cable show.

Both men described themselves as independent voices who would strive to improve the city’s business climate. They will replace Roger Creighton and Chuck Sheldon, who decided not to run for reelection.

In other Hermosa races, Treasurer Gary Brutsch, 49, easily beat two opponents, and City Clerk Elaine Doerfling ran unopposed.

And voters finally--but barely--made up their minds on what to do with the vacant beachfront lot where the old Biltmore Hotel once stood.

A ballot proposition to designate 70% of the lot for residential development and 30% for commercial development barely won approval, with 50.5% of the vote. Proceeds from the sale of the land will be used to purchase open space elsewhere in the city.

Another proposition that would have created a public park on the 0.82-acre site was defeated.

“This is one of the most tragic things for Hermosa Beach,” said Parker Herriott, who for years has advocated using the land as a public park. “We may have lost that piece of property.”

The Biltmore issue has dogged the community for more than 20 years, since the city razed the hotel on the 1400 block of The Strand. Ten times in recent years, voters have been asked what to do with the site. But until Tuesday, no option had won a majority of the vote.

Voters also approved two ballot measures calling for reductions in the height limits for commercial buildings and the portion of residential lots that can be developed.

ROLLING HILLS ESTATES

Voters returned Peter Weber, 62, to the council for a fifth term and elected two newcomers, Barbara Rauch, 55, and attorney Robert Beck, 43, both of whom serve on the city’s Planning Commission.

Beck said the new council’s first task will be to resolve the city’s differences with the Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified School District. The city recently slapped “Institutional” zoning on several vacant school sites to block the district’s efforts to sell the land for residential development.

“We must get the message to school district officials to let them know that we will be happy to cooperate with them” to find an institutional renter for the property, such as a church or school, Beck said.

EL SEGUNDO

Janice Cruikshank, 62, easily won a four-way race for the City Council seat vacated by Jim Clutter, who resigned in June because of ill health.

Michael Robbins, the second-place finisher, described Cruikshank as a “business first” candidate who would have faced stronger opposition if the “pro-community” vote had not been split by him and candidate Frank Wong.

Cruikshank took issue with that analysis.

“My main goal is to be responsive and do the right thing,” she said Wednesday. “There will be no hidden agency, no one telling me from the back room what to do.”

El Segundo’s parcel tax proposal, meanwhile, won a majority of the vote but fell short of the two-thirds margin required for passage. The three-year levy of up to $120 a year on residential and commercial property was to have been used to bolster the city’s financially strapped El Segundo Unified School District.

Times staff writers Kim Kowsky, Marc Lacey and Ronald Taylor contributed to this story.