SPECIAL REPORT / ELECTION PREVIEW : DECISION ’94 / A Voter’s Guide to State and Local Elections : L.A. County Races : ASSESSOR

* Duties: The assessor is responsible for preparing property tax bills. The department’s 1,800 employees locate taxable property in the county, identify its ownership and establish the value, including reassessments due to change in ownership, market conditions, new construction or damage.

* Major candidates: The nonpartisan race has attracted a large field of 16 candidates that is dominated by incumbent Assessor Kenneth P. Hahn and former Assessor John Lynch, who served one term. Hahn unseated Lynch from the $151,000a-year position four years ago. Many political analysts attributed his victory to his having the same name as the popular Supervisor Kenneth Hahn, who is no relation. As in the 1990 election, many of the candidates are current or former employees of the assessor’s department who are dissatisfied.

* Issues: The dominant issues are largely the same as four years ago: paperwork backlogs, a troublesome computer system and character. A more recent issue is a proposed 25% budget cut for the assessor’s office that would force the layoff of more than 400 employees and exacerbate the logjam of appeals and reassessments.

* History: The office lost much of its public profile when California voters approved Proposition 13 in 1978. That reduced assessments to a simple calculation based on the sales price of a property.

* Other candidates: Alan Bato, deputy county assessor; Robert Burman, manager in the assessor’s office; John Carl Brogdon, taxpayer appeals representative; Roy Z. Cossio, deputy assessor; Ruben Vasquez Chagoy, deputy assessor; Richard B. Forsch, attorney; Khalil Khalil, engineer; Dennis C. Kumaus, deputy assessor; Roy R. Sharman, the assessor’s chief appraiser; Marsha G. Tuton, supervising deputy assessor; William R. Lenney Jr., deputy assessor/contractor; Harley Lee Outten; assessor representative; Nick Stansfield, deputy assessor, and Janet Woods, businesswoman.