LOCAL ELECTIONS / FULLERTON CITY COUNCIL : 3 Newcomers Advise Delaying Tax Issue

A day after voters elected them to the City Council, the three special-election winners said Wednesday that they oppose forcing any action on the city’s controversial utility tax before the Nov. 8 general election.

Jan M. Flory and Conrad DeWitte, who were elected to one-month terms, said the council could not give full consideration to the complicated tax issue in the few weeks remaining before the general election, when their terms expire and they must compete against 13 other candidates for full four-year seats.

Peter Godfrey, who won a two-year term Tuesday, agreed, predicting that city officials will not place the issue on the council agenda until after the winners of the November election are inaugurated.

“To do it all during a one-month period would just stir up the pot,” said DeWitte, a 46-year-old businessman. “I’m not here for the theatrics. I want to do it intelligently. . . . It can hold off until after the election.”

DeWitte and Godfrey, a 49-year-old attorney, have vowed to repeal the 2% utility tax. Flory, a 50-year-old attorney, said she supports the tax unless it can be repealed without causing cuts in city services.

Tuesday’s election--which culminated a year of political bickering and confusion--was forced by the June recall of three council members who approved the tax last year.

The special election, which drew 23.6% of the city’s voters, cost Fullerton about $117,000. The city spent more than $100,000 on the recall election and more than $8,000 defending itself against a lawsuit filed by recall supporters.

The 2% utility tax is applied to monthly telephone, gas, electric, water and cable television bills. The levy costs a Fullerton household an average of $4.40 a month and is expected to generate $4.6 million in revenue before expiring in September, 1995.

The three special-election winners will be inaugurated at a special council meeting Tuesday. They will succeed Mayor A.B. (Buck) Catlin and council members Molly McClanahan and Don Bankhead, who were ousted in the recall.

Council members Chris Norby and Julie Sa, who were not targeted by recall leaders, agreed that the tax probably would not come up immediately.

“As much as I opposed the tax, these things have to be done in a deliberate manner, and they have to be planned,” Norby said. “The tax has to end in coordination with cutting expenditures.”

But Thomas S. Babcock, chairman of the Fullerton Recalls Committee, said the levy should be repealed as soon as possible.

“We’re ready to dump it,” he said.

Recall leaders backed three candidates in Tuesday’s election. Only one of them, DeWitte, was elected.

Flory said the election results show that “the Fullerton voter is reluctant to turn their government over to revolutionaries. They want a safe person sitting on the council.”

Neither Flory nor DeWitte had much time to celebrate their victories. With the general election 19 days away, both candidates said they will spend the next few weeks campaigning.

Tuesday’s victory was “a nice little interlude,” Flory said. “The real election for me will be Nov. 8.”

Besides Flory and DeWitte, the other candidates in the November election are: Bankhead, 62; business people Jack Dean, 46, Robert E. McNutt, 50, Michael J. Mummert, 35, Gary E. Nouskajian, 43, Stuart Stitch, 25, James Tanaka, 37, Michael J. Wagner, 46, and Bahia Wilson, 44; librarian Edith J. O’Donnell, 65; real estate agent Leland C. Wilson, 24, and transportation administrator Carole E. Wink, 55.

Dick Logemann’s name will appear on the ballot, but he has dropped out of the race.