Seminar Backers Hope to Take a Bite Out of Crime : Thousand Oaks: Daylong session Saturday will incorporate suggestions on making the city safer.

Merging an old-fashioned town meeting with high-tech electronic gadgetry, Thousand Oaks’ Crime Prevention Task Force will hold a daylong brainstorming seminar Saturday to consider how to keep the city safe.

About 170 people have registered for the session, which will feature a dozen workshops focusing on such topics as school violence, family responsibility and the media’s role in combatting crime.

Most of the day will be taken up with talking--speeches by sheriff’s deputies and community activists, and discussions in small focus groups. Yet organizers insist that all the gabbing will yield concrete results, in the form of an action plan to be presented to the City Council.

Participants will rank their priority concerns--and favorite solutions--by punching small electronic key pads wired to a vote-tallying computer. The system will be able to count votes and display results on a television screen within minutes.

By synthesizing hundreds of opinions, the futuristic technology should help organizers identify participants’ common goals. Backed by community consensus, the action plan might earn City Council approval more swiftly.

“Council members who support public safety will choose to put first the programs that the public has identified as priorities,” said Mayor Elois Zeanah, who heads the Crime Prevention Task Force.

Although Thousand Oaks was recently ranked the nation’s third-safest mid-sized city, politicians and residents alike say they feel threatened by rising crime and gang violence.

“I’m not satisfied with third,” said Otto Stoll, co-coordinator of Saturday’s session. “This symposium will be an excellence effort, not a feel-good effort.”

So far, planning for the session has generated few good feelings, at least among City Council members.

When Zeanah requested city permission to televise the seminar, her rivals on the council voiced fears that the symposium might degenerate into a political showcase. They worried that Zeanah, who is running for reelection in November, might seize the forum to grandstand or campaign.

“If doing something about crime is political, I would love to be guilty,” Zeanah responded.

Eventually, the council approved televising the event on the government cable station. Every council member except Alex Fiore, who will be out of town, has agreed to attend the seminar for at least a few hours.

But the bickering has continued.

Zeanah complained two weeks ago that she has had trouble getting help from city staff members to organize the symposium and send mailers. When pressed by Councilwoman Judy Lazar to give specific examples, Zeanah said she “chose to handle that privately.”

Worried that council infighting would detract from the long-planned symposium, Stoll felt compelled to note in an interview that “this is not a political event, not at all.”

Several Thousand Oaks residents who plan to attend the workshop agreed, saying they are willing to give up nine hours of weekend leisure because they believe that the symposium will prove an effective crime-fighting tool.

Although they now feel safe in Thousand Oaks, many said they worry about the future. Gang violence has marred several parties in the past year, and a recent melee that left two Westlake High School football players wounded shook up some residents.

“We live in such a wonderful community that when a small group of (criminal) people become visible, we’re shocked,” said Brad Baker, principal at Walnut School who will attend the conference.

“We’ve had some wake-up calls recently,” he added. “There is a problem and we need to be proactive.”

Simply by drawing together a diverse crowd--including teen-agers, senior citizens, social workers and religious leaders--the symposium might boost community awareness of the city’s crime-fighting efforts, several participants said.

“When you have such a great number of people coming together, there has to be some result, because someone will get up and say, ‘This has to be done,’ ” said Katie Petrick, a junior at Newbury Park High School.

Or, as insurance agent Ron Wetzel said: “Any time you can get people off their duffs to do something about crime, that’s good.”

FYI

The Thousand Oaks crime symposium will take place from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday at Westlake High School, 100 N. Lakeview Canyon Road. Free breakfast, lunch and a snack will be provided. To register, call co-coordinator Jimmy Sloan at 493-4953.