Anglo Wins in Pasadena’s Latino District : Election: Homeowner vote helps Crowfoot beat Morales for open seat on City Council. Two incumbents are returned to office.

An Anglo lawyer fluent in Spanish was elected Tuesday to Pasadena’s newest and most heavily Latino City Council district, edging out three other candidates.

Drawing strong support from the central city district’s middle-class homeowners, Bill Crowfoot outdistanced his closest competitor, Joseph Morales, with 55% of the vote in the mostly Latino district. Morales, who also is a lawyer, drew 39.1% of the vote.

Two other candidates, whose campaigns lacked the financial muscle of Morales’ and Crowfoot’s, trailed far behind with a combined total of less than 6%.

The race was one of several on the ballot Tuesday for Pasadena voters, who elected three council members and two school board members. There will be a runoff for a third school board seat. Also on the ballot was the question of whether Pasadena should officially name its council a City Council or continue calling it a Board of Directors.

More than two thirds of the voters supported the official name change. The city’s decision-makers have informally called themselves “council members” for two years, but a general election was required to formalize the switch.

Meanwhile, in the other council races, incumbents Chris Holden and William Thomson won easily. In school board voting, incumbents George Padilla and Anne Pursel also were reelected, but incumbent Wilbert L. Smith drew only 34.9% of the vote and faces a runoff against challenger Lisa Fowler, who won 46.2% of the vote.

The race in council District 5--created by a redistricting task force last year in the hopes of giving the city’s Latinos greater participation in city government--had been hotly contested.

Along with Morales and Crowfoot, the candidates included painting contractor Christopher Bray and book salesman Ken Saurenman.

During the race, Morales and Crowfoot challenged each other’s credentials for representing the octopus-shaped district in the heart of the city. Crowfoot questioned Morales’ voting history, revealing that his opponent had never voted in Pasadena and that he had moved to the district from a more affluent Pasadena neighborhood only six months ago.

Morales’ supporters, meanwhile, accused Crowfoot--who lived in Puerto Rico as a child--of misrepresenting himself as of Latino descent. The district’s overall population is 58% Latino, but fewer than 17% of registered voters are Latino.

In District 3, Holden’s challenger was Robert Edwards, the manager of a low-income housing development in northwest Pasadena. Thomson’s challenger in southeast Pasadena, meanwhile, was Dorrie Poole, a lawyer endorsed by the National Women’s Political Caucus of Pasadena.

ELECTION RETURNS

Counting of late and absentee ballots could alter the outcome in some races. Winners in bold.

OFFICES

Pasadena City Council

District 3

6 of 6 Precincts

CANDIDATE VOTE % Chris Holden* 815 82.8 Robert Edwards 170 17.2

District 5

10 of 10 Precincts

CANDIDATE VOTE % Bill Crowfoot 663 55.0 Joseph Morales 471 39.1 Ken Saurenman 47 3.8 Christopher Bray 23 1.9

District 7

6 of 6 Precincts

CANDIDATE VOTE % William Thomson* 1,407 58.2 Dorrie Poole 1,012 41.8

Board of Education

89 of 89 Precincts Reporting

Seat 1

CANDIDATE VOTE % George A. Padilla* 7,423 61.6 Timothy Price 4,642 38.4

Seat 3

CANDIDATE VOTE % Lisa Fowler 5,753 46.2 Wilbert L. Smith* 4,356 34.9 Geoffrey Commons 2,361 18.9

Seat 5

CANDIDATE VOTE % Anne Pursel* 7,519 61.0 Andrew Paterson 3,536 28.6 Kevork Keushkerian 1,283 10.4

NOTE:

In all races, if no candidate wins more

than 50% of the vote, the top two

meet in a runoff.

* Denotes incumbent

BALLOT MEASURE

Proposition 1

Shall the city’s charter be amended to use “City Council” as the sole reference to the city’s legislative body, to change “Chairman” to “Mayor,” “Vice Chairman” to “Vice Mayor,” and “Director” to “Council Member?”

70 of 70 Precincts Reporting

MEASURE VOTE % Yes 5,950 67.8 No 2,825 32.2