ELECTIONS / SAN GABRIEL : Council Races Exhibit Little of Past Anger

The anger and contentiousness that once dominated this small suburb’s political scene seem like ancient history as seven candidates, three of them incumbents, vie for three City Council seats in the April 14 election.

The incumbents, Mayor Mary Cammarano and Councilmen James Castaneda and John Tapp, were part of the slow-growth movement that organized in 1987 and became embroiled in a divisive recall of one of its leaders two years later.

The three council members say that growth issues have largely been resolved and their opponents have made little mention of them in this campaign.

Instead, as the city faces its possible third year of deficit spending, the three incumbents are being criticized by three of their four challengers for poor fiscal management.

“We got lots of new blood, but the trouble was you couldn’t tell where the new blood left off and the red ink started,” said challenger Helen Achilles, 79, a former council member who said she has returned to politics because of the city’s spending habits. “Money has been spent so unnecessarily. The reserves have been almost depleted.”

Over the past two years, the council has drawn more than $1 million from the city’s reserve. At present, city officials say, the reserve fund--a municipality’s version of a savings account--contains $2.3 million compared to an operating budget of about $15 million.

Although the reserve account is still large, the council last year eliminated seven vacant positions in the police, fire and public works departments, and it is expected to consider further budget cuts to make ends meet this year.

“The main issue now is the budget,” said Castaneda, 34, a construction engineer. “We need to live within our means.” This year, he said, will be no better than the past two. “It’s going to be a devastating budget year.”

Cammarano, first elected in a special election in 1989, said she justifies the 1990 use of reserve funds as necessary to replace outdated public safety equipment and to automate the Police Department. Cammarano, 51, is an office manager for a masons’ union.

Both Cammarano and Tapp, a 47-year-old accountant, also said they reluctantly supported the use of $144,000 from the city’s reserve account to meet the demands of the 1991-92 budget.

Castaneda, though he supported the use of reserves for 1990-91, voted against a similar approach last year.

But Tapp said that failing to use the reserve money last summer would have meant elimination of the city planner’s post and severely trimming recreation programs.

Two outspoken opponents of using the reserves are candidates Achilles and Harry L. Baldwin, a 54-year-old employee benefits administrator and the current president of the San Gabriel Chamber of Commerce.

Each time money is spent, Baldwin said, “we have to stop and think about where the money is going to come from.” The city, he said, needs to find ways to carefully develop its commercial sector to boost tax revenues, rather than draw from the reserves.

Beginning in 1958, Achilles was elected to the council for seven consecutive terms. She resigned in 1983 to become the city treasurer for five years but was defeated by the slow-growth slate in 1988.

Another critic of using the reserve fund is Tony Thompson, a 22-year-old aerospace engineer. “I’m not against using the reserves,” he said. “I just want to have more restraint.”

Achilles and Thompson said they have been called too old and too young by others, but they said their ages should not be held against them. Achilles, who said her father had good health far into his 90s before he died at 98, said: “A great many people have done important things after age 65.”

At the other end of the spectrum, Thompson said his youth means that he has plenty of energy to devote to the council.

Another first-time candidate in his 20s, Ed Browne, a 28-year-old businessman, said he is running because “basically I’m unhappy with the leadership in San Gabriel.”

He said he opposes any moves to create a redevelopment agency and, in an unrelated issue, opposes the proposal to unify the San Gabriel school district and build a new high school.

In spite of their differences, the candidates have avoided the personality politics that dominated the 1989 recall movement that resulted in the ouster of Frank Blaszcak, who had been elected as part of the slow-growth slate but later fell out of favor with the others, who accused him of abusing his privilege by using city funds to buy an expensive cellular phone. He was replaced by Cammarano.

The bitter fights of the past “have gone away,” said Castaneda, first elected along with Tapp and Blaszcak in 1988.

The three incumbents say they have accomplished the goals of the short-lived and now defunct Citizens For Responsible Development, which organized to fight against the spread of apartments and condominiums.

As an example, Cammarano cited regulations such as the 1990 anti-mansionization ordinance to prevent smaller residences from being converted into bulkier ones and the continued work on the city’s General Plan.