LOCAL ELECTIONS / L.A. CITY COUNCIL : Contrast in Styles in 13th District Runoff : Politics: Jackie Goldberg represents a return to ‘60s-style activism, while Tom LaBonge takes a roll-up-your-sleeves approach to his work.

Sweeping past their challengers, longtime Los Angeles City Councilmen Zev Yaroslavsky and Marvin Braude on Tuesday easily won four more years at City Hall, while in Hollywood two politicos must now renew the battle for the council seat being given up by mayoral candidate Michael Woo.

After all the clamor about change, all the talk about bringing new faces and voices to Los Angeles government, voters in the crowded 13th Council District race chose as finalists the two contenders who had the most experience in government: former Los Angeles school board member Jackie Goldberg and longtime City Council aide Tom LaBonge.

LaBonge and Goldberg will face each other in a June 8 runoff in precincts from Los Feliz and Silver Lake to Hollywood and Eagle Rock.

As they head into a new campaign, they present voters with stark options.

In style and substance, Goldberg represents a return to ‘60s-style activism. She also will be seeking to become the council’s first openly homosexual member.

LaBonge is a different kind of throwback, an old-time, roll-up-your-sleeves candidate seemingly more suited to a Brooklyn precinct than a Los Angeles district that includes Hollywood.

The two placed well ahead of six other contenders for the seat that Woo is giving up to run for mayor. Unofficial final results showed Goldberg with 35% of the vote and LaBonge with 31%. Behind them were Tom Riley, a former aide to U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer’s campaign; AIDS Healthcare Foundation President Michael Weinstein; businesswoman and community activist Virginia Stock Johannessen; television executive Conrado Terrazas; executive marketing consultant Gilbert Carrasco, and health care consultant Sal Genovese.

With an open seat at stake, spending by the eight candidates approached $1 million. LaBonge spent almost $300,000 on his primary campaign, while Goldberg managed to raise and spend more than $200,000 despite refusing to take contributions from development interests.

The prospect of becoming the council’s first openly gay or lesbian member was not lost on Goldberg election night, but it was hardly the only thing on her mind.

“Absolutely . . . that’s a part of this race. It’s an important part, but I won’t say it’s the most important part,” a jubiliant Goldberg said in an interview as her supporters cheered election returns.

“The most important part of this race is making sure that everybody--lesbian and gay, black and brown, Asian-Pacific and Anglo, young and old . . . feels like this city is about them and not about some special groups of interest that can buy and sell what goes on in City Hall.”

LaBonge, in contrast, said his candidacy gives voters an opportunity to elect a proven public servant with 17 years of experience as an aide to Council President John Ferraro and a reputation as a hard worker at City Hall.

“We got our message out and we will continue to get our message out . . . that Tom LaBonge is somebody who gets things done for neighborhoods, who makes neighborhoods better, who brings people together,” he said.

As they move into a runoff, Goldberg and LaBonge can be expected to emphasize themes high on the minds of voters: crime and jobs. The topics have repeatedly been raised by voters in the ethnically diverse district, which is 57% Latino, 21% Anglo, 19% Asian and 3% black, according to Census figures.

As a teacher and parent, Goldberg, 48, has focused much of her campaign on reducing crime and increasing jobs through education programs and projects that train and employ young people. Her proposals include a mentoring project for junior high school students and a private-sector jobs program for 18-to-25-year-olds patterned after a successful Boston project.

LaBonge, 39, has called for reassigning 180 traffic officers to patrol duty at the city’s police stations. And to spur the district’s economy, LaBonge’s plans include revitalizing some of its major streets--Sunset, Hollywood and Glendale boulevards--to encourage new investment and create more jobs.

5th Council District

Fueled by the power of the incumbency and a flood of special-interest campaign contributions, Yaroslavsky easily won a sixth term on the council. Surrounded by scores of delighted supporters at his North Hollywood campaign headquarters late Tuesday, he praised his staff and volunteers for his impressive re-election victory.

“Our strategy was no mystery,” Yaroslavsky said. “We just campaigned like crazy.”

Referring to the change in his district caused by the reapportionment process following the 1990 Census, he said, “With 25% of the district new to me, we didn’t take anything for granted.”

Yaroslavsky, the powerful chairman of the council’s Budget and Finance Committee, won almost 68% of the vote, compared with 26% for his chief rival, environmental activist Laura Lake. Mike Rosenberg, a city building inspector, had 6%.

The district stretches from the Fairfax district and Westwood across the Santa Monica Mountains to Sherman Oaks and North Hollywood.

Yaroslavsky, 44, said he plans to devote his efforts in the next four years to reducing crime, keeping the city’s finances afloat, and pushing for reform of the city’s 1926 charter.

On the crime front, Yaroslavsky said he will promote a statewide initiative to enable voters to approve tax increases to hire police and fire personnel by a simple majority, rather than the two-thirds vote currently required.

“With the failure of Prop. 1, it’s obvious we’ve got to make some changes (in the state law) if we are going to get serious about curbing crime,” he said.

Yaroslavsky had supported Proposition 1, which gained support of almost 59% of voters, but failed for lack of two-thirds approval. The measure would have raised property taxes to pay for hiring 1,000 new Los Angeles police officers.

The ballot measure provided one of the few issues for debate between Yaroslavsky and Lake, who opposed it.

“This campaign was really not about issues; it was more about character,” Yaroslavsky said, adding that after 18 years in office, he viewed the election as a “referendum on my job performance.”

For Lake, a longtime slow-growth advocate and Yaroslavsky critic, the outcome was a disappointment after she failed to match the 33% vote total of 1989, when she first tried to unseat the veteran councilman.

The former UCLA professor sought to put the best face on the election.

“Not a lot of people turned out to vote,” she said. “If there’s a meaning (in the results) it’s that the special interests are calling the shots.”

Lake garnered some endorsements from environmentalists and women’s groups and had hoped that Yaroslavsky’s long incumbency would work in her favor.

But Yaroslavsky drew support from a broad array of neighborhood leaders, environmentalists and political activists, and picked up an endorsement from the National Organization for Women.

Perhaps most significant, the veteran councilman raised five times as much money as his chief rival, much of it from special interests.

Asked if the defeat marks the end of her City Council ambitions, Lake was noncommital.

“Right now I have a lot of laundry to do and a bar mitzvah to plan,” she said. “We’ll wait and see about whatever else.”

11th Council District

Far better known and far better financed than his challengers, Braude easily defeated two rivals to capture an eighth term at City Hall. Final unofficial results show the veteran councilman pulled 61% of the vote.

West Los Angeles attorney Daniel W. Pritikin drew just under 30% of the vote in his first foray into politics. Another political newcomer, Brentwood restaurateur John B. Handal II, ran a distant third with 9%.

Braude, 72, was upbeat after coasting to victory in the first election campaign in a dozen years in which he faced opposition. “It’s just wonderful,” he said Wednesday after reviewing the results. “I’m delighted with the outcome.”

The race was a classic example of an incumbent with 28 years in office having the money, the endorsements and the record to beat back the challenge posed by two unknown and underfinanced opponents.

The district includes parts of Palms and West Los Angeles, all of Brentwood and Pacific Palisades and the San Fernando Valley communities of Woodland Hills, Tarzana, Encino and part of Van Nuys.

Like Yaroslavsky, if there was a disappointment on Election Day for Braude, it was the failure for the second time of a ballot measure to increase property taxes to pay for 1,000 more police officers.

Braude pleaded with voters to support the tax increase. He complained bitterly that a minority of voters are preventing the city from deploying more police officers on the street.

Braude joined in calling for changes in the property-tax slashing Proposition 13. “We have to change the state law that requires a two-third vote,” he said. “The 170,000 people who voted no are holding a city of 3.5 million people hostage. . . . We are being strangled by a minority of people.”

He was sharply critical of candidates, including his own opponents and mayoral front-runner Richard Riordan, who urged defeat of the tax increase for more police.

As chairman of the council’s Public Safety Committee, Braude said the challenge now will be preserving the Los Angeles Police Department at its current strength. He said any increase in the size of the police force is very unlikely given the city’s severe budget problems.

After being elected eight times since 1965, Braude was also displeased with the voters’ approval of term limits for council members. “I’m dismayed, but I’m not surprised that people can’t find a better way to express their frustration than to pass term limits,” he said.

There was never much doubt that Braude would dominate the campaign. He raised $199,143 in contributions, more than four times the total raised by Pritikin, his closest rival.

This story was reported and written by Times staff writers Jeffrey L. Rabin, Ron Russell and Greg Krikorian.