6 to Compete for Burbank Council Seats in April Runoff : Elections: One of two school board openings is filled. Weather is blamed for lower-than-expected voter turnout.

Burbank voters, their ranks reduced by rain, filled one of two open school board seats in Tuesday’s elections, but failed to give any of the candidates for the City Council a victory, setting up a runoff vote April 13.

City Clerk Marge Lauerman won a second four-year term, taking 53% of the vote against Margarita Campos. City Treasurer Jim Rogers was unopposed.

Six of the 19 candidates for three seats on the council--none of them incumbents--won places in the runoff, which must be held because no candidate received more than 50%. The highest vote totals went to Bill Wiggins, Dave Golonski, Richard Messer and Susan Spanos, who each received 13% to 10% of the vote.

All others received less than 10% apiece. They were led by Robert C. Kramer and Ron Shively, who also won slots in the run-off.

Joe Hooven won one four-year seat on the Board of Education, with 53% of the vote, leaving incumbent Vivian Kaufman and Denise Wilcox to battle over the remaining seat in April. In last place was S. Michael Stavropoulos, a veteran of several court fights with the school board and who became the subject of a bitter battle of words in the closing days of the campaign.

Only 20% of the voters turned out on a windy, rainy day to cast ballots, compared to the 30% turnout that is normal for such elections, Lauerman said. “It was raining very heavily,” she said. “The people who are out there are really interested.”

The turnout also may have been low because some voters were confused by the number of City Council candidates, Lauerman said. “A lot of people just weren’t sure what to do,” she said.

“I think people in Burbank want a legislator who’s successful,” said Wiggins, the top vote-getter in the council race. “I have campaigned with no agenda other than to be open and available to the people.”

Hooven, vice president of the Burbank Educational Foundation and chairman of the city’s Park and Recreation Board, said he was surprised by his showing because “there’s an incumbent running,” and because one candidate, Stavropoulos, spent thousands of dollars.

Hooven attributed his win to his experience working within the city system. “I’m a positive person,” he said. “I don’t antagonize. I work for change within the system.”

Hooven said his first task will be school modernization. He also plans to reintroduce the idea of televising school board meetings “so everybody can see what’s going on and people will start getting involved.” Golonski, a six-year Burbank resident, said his second-place showing demonstrated that city residents “want people who are going to work to represent the entire community and build a consensus.”

In the days before the election, workers scrambled to correct a potentially disastrous problem with the voting apparatus.

“The supplier furnished us with the wrong plates,” Lauerman said. “You would punch in a vote and it was for another city. We had to go out and exchange every single one of the voting machines.”

The problem was first discovered by a poll worker late last week when the vote recorders were delivered, Lauerman said. The company finished replacing the faulty equipment the day before the election, she said.

Tuesday’s race for City Council was the most populous in Burbank history, with 19 candidates--but no incumbents.

Unlike campaigns of recent years, when development was the major issue on the agenda, this year’s council campaign was dominated by discussion of Burbank’s ailing economy. Most of the candidates agreed that Burbank--although it has fared far better than other cities--has felt the sting of the recent recession.

The city has lost 15,000 jobs over the last two years, as major employers--such as Lockheed--have packed up and left for other cities.

City Council candidates debated ways of attracting businesses to replace those that have left, as well as methods of reducing the city’s budget by $5 million to $7 million.

Last year, Burbank Mayor Robert R. Bowne decided to draw suggestions from citizens on how best to handle the city’s changing economic profile. The mayor appointed two committees, FOCUS (Future of City User Services), to review city services and find ways of delivering them in a more efficient and less costly fashion, and the Business Review Committee, which studied the city’s budget and business practices.

Suggestions made by those bodies were also debated by candidates.

The race for school board focused on the question of Burbank’s deteriorating school facilities. Candidates agreed that the city’s two high schools, Burbank and Burroughs, are desperately in need of renovation. The schools are more than 50 years old and are inadequate for the city’s burgeoning school age population.

For the first time in Burbank history, the school board last year wrestled with the idea of implementing a year-round school program as a means of combatting overcrowding in Burbank schools.

All four candidates rejected a suggestion by the Business Review Committee that the school board sell Burbank High School and use the proceeds, along with other funds, to finance the construction of one large school. However, candidates offered differing views on how best to fund the renovation of both schools.

In the last few days of the election, the school board race became particularly heated and bitter as school board Vice President Audrey Hanson, who is not running for election, launched a campaign against Stavropoulos.

Hanson and her supporters argued that Stavropoulos, who has a history of vitriolic lawsuits and battles with the district, was ill-suited to serve on the board.

Stavropoulos’ supporters accused Hanson and others of “slinging mud” and evading the issues. The dispute was played out in the pages of the local newspaper, the Burbank Leader, with both sides taking out ads.

Times staff writer Julie Tamaki contributed to this story.

Burbank Election Results City Council 3 vacancies

CANDIDATE VOTES % Bill Wiggins 3,660 13.3% Dave Golonski 3,264 11.9% Richard G. Messer 2,887 10.5% Susan Spanos 2,864 10.4% Robert C. Kramer 2,303 8.4% Ron Shively 2,302 8.4% Carolyn Berlin 2,195 8.0% Thomas H. McCauley 1,924 7.0% Elena V. Cook 1,288 4.7% Lou Morelli 807 3.0% D. Dianne Adams 791 2.9% Jules Kimmett 748 2.7% Robert W. Bates 597 2.2% Marti Israel 460 1.7% Ron Watters 425 1.5% John D. Hardy 307 1.1% Gregory Jackson 252 0.9% Melvin Perlitsh 252 0.9% Thomas Pratt 142 0.5%

Board of Education 2 vacancies

CANDIDATE VOTES % Joe Hooven 5,342 53.0% Vivian Kaufman 4,679 26.4% Denise Wilcox 4,528 25.6% S. Michael Stavropoulos 3,140 17.7%

City Clerk

CANDIDATE VOTES % Marge Lauerman 5,083 53.8% Margarita Campos 4,349 46.2%

City Treasurer

Unopposed

CANDIDATE VOTES % Jim Rogers 6,414 100%