Candidates Line Up to Fill Opening on City Council : Thousand Oaks: Several unsuccessful contenders in November’s balloting express interest in running if a special election is held.

Even as some residents said the last thing they want on Thousand Oaks street corners is a fresh crop of campaign signs, likely contenders for a City Council vacancy emerged Wednesday, including fall council candidates Lee Laxdal and Mike Markey and supervisorial candidate Trudi Loh.

The city will apparently hold a special election in June, since the City Council deadlocked Tuesday night on how to fill a council seat vacated by Frank Schillo, who resigned after being elected to the County Board of Supervisors in November.

The election cannot be formally called until Jan. 6, but the campaign season of 1995 began almost instantly. Within minutes of the deadlock, Markey--the fourth-place finisher last month--had made his way into the hall, declared his intention to run and received his first $50 contribution.

Markey said he was disappointed that he was not appointed to the vacant seat Tuesday night.

“I don’t think the decision was made in the city’s best interests,” he said. “But I’m not bitter. I’m a survivor. I’ll pick up and move on.”

Other possible candidates emerged just as quickly, with Loh--who staged a well-financed campaign against Schillo and lost by a narrow margin--saying she is considering a run.

Markey, a pro-business candidate who said he is neutral on development issues, said he was not worried about going up against Loh, who ran on a strong pro-environment platform for supervisor.

“She’s got to beat me; I don’t have to beat her,” he said. “She’s got to come after me.”

Loh said Wednesday that she would wait until after the holidays to make a final decision.

“I think we should allow everybody to go home and have their holiday,” she said. “I want to make a very considered choice and not rush into anything.”

She has already received widespread support, she said.

“I think the person who fills that seat would hopefully be someone who can bring a consensus to the council,” Loh said, “not someone who has been handpicked by one side or another.”

The 37-year-old attorney spent about $100,000 on her supervisorial campaign, as did Schillo, who won with 51.4% of the vote.

A City Council race would be far less expensive, Loh said. “This would be much more of a grass-roots campaign.”

Lance Winslow, who placed ninth out of 16 council candidates in November, said he will run again. The 29-year-old owner of the Car Wash Guys said he plans to solicit contributions from the 14,600 customers in his business database.

“I’m going to ask everybody for 20 bucks this time,” he said. “I’m going to knock on every door in this community this time.”

Winslow was the first candidate to officially declare. While pleading with the council to appoint Markey on Tuesday, he said he would run in a special election if one is held.

Former candidate Ekbal Quidwai, who received 1.3% of November’s vote, said he is also running.

Several other fall candidates said they were considering running, including Laxdal, a former councilman who placed only 519 votes behind Markey, and eighth-place finisher Greg Cole.

“I’m going to be talking with people about it,” Laxdal said. “This is going to be a wild election. . . . Money will probably figure pretty largely in this one. We have things coming before the council that I’m sure the developers want to see get through. And they want to see someone elected who is going to do that.”

David Hare and M. Ali Issari said they believed that it was too early to make a decision and both have doubts about running.

“The last election was really ugly,” Hare said. “It left a bad taste in my mouth.”

Planning Commissioner Irv Wasserman said he did not want to undertake another campaign, as did fall candidates Michael Friedman, Marshall Dixon, Chuck Morsa and Bill Williams. Jeanette Scovill did not return calls Wednesday.

Williams said he plans to focus instead on a recall effort aimed at Councilwoman Elois Zeanah and Mayor Jaime Zukowski. He accused them of financial irresponsibility.

“If we can get the petitions drawn up, we can have the recall at the same time as the special election,” he said. “And I want to put a statement in there that says that if the recall is successful, the vacancies would be filled by appointment only.”

Zeanah said she is not concerned about the talk of a recall effort.

“If they want to do that, they certainly have the money to hire people to get signatures,” she said. “I frankly think the public is not going to fall for this.”

County election officials estimate the cost of a special election at $98,000, or $1.53 per registered voter. But city officials said additional costs incurred by the city could bring the tally to $105,000.

If a countywide election was planned for June--or if a countywide or statewide initiative qualifies for the June ballot--the cost to the city would be one-tenth that amount, according to county elections chief Bruce Bradley.

There is still a possibility that the council could break its deadlock before Jan. 6. But after lengthy discussion Tuesday night, a compromise seemed unlikely.

A motion by Zeanah for each council member to nominate candidates was quickly shot down by council members Andy Fox and Judy Lazar. Zeanah withdrew the motion, and no others were made.

“With no motion, it goes to special election,” Zukowski said.