Dana Forced Into Runoff; Burke-Watson Race Likely : L.A. County: Supervisor’s rival Swanson rides an anti-incumbent wave. Antonovich is well ahead of challengers.

Supervisor Deane Dana, in a stunning development in Tuesday’s balloting, was forced into a runoff, and Yvonne Brathwaite Burke and Diane Watson appeared headed for a November showdown in their battle to become Los Angeles County’s first elected black supervisor.

Dana, a 12-year veteran supervisor, was caught in an apparent wave of anti-incumbent sentiment that set up a November runoff against Rolling Hills City Councilwoman Gordana Swanson. Dana was falling short of the 50%-plus-one vote required to avoid a runoff.

The election promised to further shake up the once all-male, all-white governing board of the nation’s most populous county. The board gained its first Latino member, Gloria Molina, last year. And now, in addition to the election of the first black supervisor, Swanson’s strong challenge to Dana raises the prospect that women could, for the first time, become a majority on the five-member board.

Supervisor Mike Antonovich led his six underfunded challengers by a comfortable margin. Proposition A, a $100-million sprinkler bond issue spawned by a spectacular fire at a county high-rise this year, was losing badly.

Burke and Watson were locked in a tight battle that made a runoff a virtual certainty in the 2nd District race to succeed retiring Supervisor Kenneth Hahn.

In the 4th District race, Dana went to a podium just before midnight to address about 40 supporters and acknowledged that he potentially faced a runoff.

“We may well win without being in a runoff,” Dana said at his election night headquarters in a Long Beach hotel. “If we don’t, so what? If we do go into a runoff, it will be a very positive campaign and we will win it with no problem at all.”

Dana attributed the surprising results to attacks by the Swanson campaign and he acknowledged that being a woman had something to do with support she has garnered.

Asked what he would have done differently in his campaign, Dana said his ever-present “Great Job, Supervisor Deane Dana” signs perhaps should have read “Good Job.”

While the mood in the Dana camp was decidedly subdued, supporters at Swanson’s headquarters in the San Pedro Sheraton Hotel waited to dig in to a huge red, white and blue cake that was inscribed with “Great Job, Gordana Swanson”--a play on Dana’s own campaign theme.”

“This is a nice, nice evening,” Swanson said. “I’m very, very encouraged.

“These results mean we have done a whole lot better than Dana did in 1980,” when he defeated incumbent Supervisor Burke. “What this indicates is that history will repeat itself. . . . We knew all along that he was in trouble, but his (campaign) money intimidated people for a while.”

Antonovich, who watched returns for his race with supporters at the Airport Marriot, looked at the results of his conservative colleague’s race and said, “That’s a serious problem.”

Antonovich attributed Dana’s troubles to “an anti-incumbency factor and the new alignment of the supervisorial districts. There are a lot more new areas for him this time.” When asked why those factors did not affect his campaign as drastically, Antonovich just shrugged.

Meanwhile, at Burke’s campaign party in the ballroom of the Howard Johnson’s in the Fox Hills area of Culver City, early results at 9:30 showed Burke holding onto a solid lead. She addressed a room of about 150 supporters, including City Councilman Nate Holden, saying: “I still have my fingers crossed. I’m still hoping for a victory tonight. I know it will be a long night, but we’re going to win this.”

Burke then left the campaign party to join supporters of Charter Amendment F, the Police Department reform measure, at the downtown Biltmore Hotel.

But retiring Supervisor Kenneth Hahn, a Burke supporter, said: “This is the first night in 45 years that I am not a candidate and waiting for the returns.”

He said he felt “kind of sad. . . . I’ll miss all the fire and excitement. There’s nothing more exciting in life than election night.”

As a subdued crowd pondered the early results, Hahn was asked about Burke’s chances: “I’m an old politician who believes in waiting until the last vote is counted,” he replied.

At Watson’s campaign party, held in a circus-size tent erected on a Crenshaw Boulevard parking lot across from a burned-out shopping center, deputy campaign manager Tony Nicholas said: “We’ve seen a trend that we feel very good about. We hope in the early morning hours to go over the top. And we feel very confident that we will be very close to 50% plus one.”

Watson arrived at her campaign party shortly before 11 p.m., read the latest results showing a virtual dead heat with Burke and said: “We know we are going to win. . . . We are going up and they are going down. We’re going to stay here as long as it takes to win. . . . I think we’re going to do all right.”

Watson said: “Our votes take a little longer in South-Central. But that’s all right. It’s onward and upward.”

Burke and Watson, pioneering black women in California Democratic Party politics, will meet in a runoff for the 2nd District seat being vacated by Hahn.

An old-style, backslapping politician, Hahn has represented the heavily minority district since 1952, the waning days of the Truman Administration.

No matter who wins the runoff, the balloting will culminate in the county’s first election of a black supervisor. Burke was appointed to the board in 1979 but lost the election in 1980.

The district is centered in South Los Angeles and includes Koreatown, the Crenshaw District, USC, Baldwin Hills, Ladera Heights, Watts, Carson, Culver City, Compton, Lynwood and Inglewood.

The area was hard-hit by the recent riots, whose aftermath ended up providing a showcase for the candidates’ different styles.

Burke, 59, an attorney and former congresswoman trying to return to the board after a 12-year absence, was seen as being tougher on lawbreakers who looted during the unrest.

Watson, 58, who has represented South Los Angeles for 16 years on the school board and now as a state senator, was more visible than Burke during and after the riots, and focused more on underlying social causes of the disorder.

Watson, supported by the Los Angeles County Democratic Party and many labor unions, sought to portray herself as more likely than Burke to join Molina in shaking up the county bureaucracy.

The state senator pledged that her first act would be to seek to fire Chief Administrative Officer Richard B. Dixon. Dixon has come under fire for wielding too much bureaucratic authority, spending lavishly for office redecoration and management bonuses and helping to craft controversial pension changes that will cost taxpayers more than $265 million.

Burke, backed by much of the county’s political Establishment, was more conciliatory than Watson in her comments about Dixon.

She ran with the backing of Hahn, who provided her with $45,000 in late contributions and loans.

In the final days of the campaign, Burke used such donations to escalate her attacks on Watson, airing radio commercials and sending out mailers. One brochure called attention to a $21,000 fine that Watson paid in 1989 for dipping into her campaign treasury to pay for personal travel, clothing and jewelry.

In the other supervisors’ races, Antonovich and Dana came under attack for the board’s approval of enhanced pension benefits for county officials. In addition, they came under criticism for bulletproof cars, chauffeurs and other perks enjoyed by most supervisors.

A possible backlash against incumbents clearly was on their minds. Antonovich and Dana--conservatives who were first elected in 1980--each raised more than $1 million for a last-minute mail blitz highlighting their endorsements from law enforcement.

Dana faced the stronger challenge in the coastal 4th District from Swanson. She poured $90,000 of her own money into a tough media campaign, attacking Dana for what she said are the excessive perks enjoyed by the supervisors. She pledged, if elected, to push for a two-term limit for supervisors.

In the 5th District, Antonovich faced six challengers who through their combined strength hoped to force him into a runoff.

The best-known challenger was Pasadena Councilman William Paparian. He gained widespread media attention in December when he challenged the use of Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies for Rose Parade security on the grounds that deputies in the Lynwood station had been accused of forming a white supremacist group.

Antonovich sought to highlight his support for law enforcement, expecting that message to play better in the conservative district.

Times staff writers Amy Pyle, Ron Russell and Hector Tobar contributed to this story.