Pomona Elects Latino Mayor; Compton to Have Runoff : Suburbs: Planning Commissioner Cortez defeats former Councilman Ursua in historic vote. In Compton, council members Bradley and Moore vie for mayoral post.

Pomona voters Tuesday elected the first Latino mayor in the city’s 105-year history, and a fractious mayoral race in Compton appeared destined for a runoff as suburban voters in several Southland communities headed to the polls.

Eddie Cortez, a 52-year-old service station owner who has spent most of his life in Pomona, made history in the San Gabriel Valley’s largest city, besting former Councilman Tomas Ursua in a runoff for the top post.

Pomona, with a population of nearly 132,000, was 51% Latino in 1990, when the last U.S. Census was taken. But it has been only in the past year--with the election of two Latino council members--that that ethnic group has gained serious political power. Cortez’s election, not only a milestone for the city’s now-dominant ethnic group, also cements a Latino majority on the seven-member City Council.

During the campaign, Ursua, a Pomona native, had touted his four years of experience on the council. He promised to focus on the needs of the city’s youth and to streamline government, including a reduction in Pomona’s steep 10% utility tax.

Meanwhile, six-year Planning Commissioner Cortez--who has lived in Pomona for 30 years--played up his civic and community ties and criticized Ursua for proposing that the utility tax be killed without naming an alternative source of funds.

In Compton, where three well-known front-runners had jockeyed--sometimes angrily--for the mayoral post, Councilman Omar Bradley and Councilwoman Patricia Moore appeared headed for a runoff, trailed by Kenneth Tucker, the youngest son of a prominent Compton family.

Tucker is the son and brother of Compton’s two previous mayors, and Moore recently sparked controversy for anti-police remarks she made at the funeral of two Compton officers. Bradley is a Lynwood High School teacher elected to the City Council two years ago.

Going into the race, Tucker and Moore had the highest profiles in the community in southeast Los Angeles County. But Bradley gave them a tough fight, raising thousands of dollars more than his opponents in campaign contributions in a battle so contentious that at one point, a Superior Court commissioner ordered Bradley and his family and Tucker and his family to keep away from each other.

The trio were among a field of six candidates who promised to hire more police officers, provide jobs and clean up the image of a city that, to many outsiders, is seen as a dangerous and decrepit place. But the issue that dominated the campaign was the council’s decision to approve a card casino project without first asking the voters what they thought.

With the exception of Bradley, who voted for the project, the other candidates said the issue should have been decided by the voters, and some warned that gambling would bring nothing but trouble to a troubled city.

Meanwhile in local school board elections, challenger Lisa Fowler, a former music teacher, unseated incumbent Wilbert L. Smith in a tough runoff battle for an open seat on the Pasadena Board of Education. And in Arcadia, a $28-million bond measure to renovate the city’s schools succeeded in its second try, and incumbents Joann E. Steinmeier and Mary E. Dougherty were reelected.