SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO : 3 Council Winners Pledge Cohesion

All three winners in the City Council race said this week they will work to preserve the rustic flavor of the community while trying to revitalize downtown.

“I think we are going to have a pretty good dynamic,” said David M. Swerdlin, who finished third.

Wyatt T. Hart, a retired sheriff’s captain, and incumbent Gil Jones easily took the top two spots.

“Rest assured, we are going to be a cohesive group,” Hart said Wednesday.

For the third seat, Swerdlin had to outpace Carlos Negrete, who mounted a last-minute mailer barrage and finished only 267 votes behind, according to unofficial results.

Swerdlin said he would seek to shore up city code enforcement. He said he views himself as a consensus builder between downtown pro-development interests and historical preservationists.

Jones said his first goal would be to arrange a way for developers to meet with the council in a workshop setting to discuss cooperating on proposals early in the planning stages and going over the city’s strict building standards.

“I want developers to understand at the outset that there will be a difficult road, but we will try to help them get their project through the process if they have a project that is acceptable,” Jones said.

The three council winners also said they intend to move forward on approving a conceptual plan for a downtown inn and retail complex on five acres of city-owned property.

Negrete, who sent about 15,000 mailers the weekend before the election, campaigned on a platform of cutting government waste and being a watchdog against what he called an “old-boy network.”

Negrete said he would continue to monitor city government, but added he was pleased that Swerdlin had won a seat.