THOUSAND OAKS : Residents to Protest Special City Election

A group of Thousand Oaks residents is planning a New Year’s Eve rally in opposition to holding a special election to fill a vacancy on the City Council.

The Dec. 31 rally will be held from 10 a.m. to noon at the Civic Arts Plaza.

“We’re trying to get four or five thousand people out there,” organizer Ken Calcut said. “We’re trying to show them we’re not troublemakers or anything. We’re just citizens who don’t want a special election.”

Calcut favors appointing Mike Markey, the fourth-place finisher in a field of 16 candidates who ran for the council in November. Last week, the City Council deadlocked on whether to appoint Markey or have a special election.

The four council members have until Jan. 6 to resolve the issue, and Calcut said he hopes that the rally will help change the minds of Councilwoman Elois Zeanah and Mayor Jaime Zukowski, who have said they would prefer a special election.

If the council cannot make a decision, the city is mandated to have a special election, to be held in June at an estimated cost of about $105,000.

Calcut, who attended last week’s council meeting armed with a sheath of signed petitions favoring Markey’s appointment, said he is not a participant in a group beginning a recall effort to oust Zeanah and Zukowski.

“No one wins in a recall,” he said. “I think all it does is disrupt the government. We’re not rabble-rousers. All we’re trying to do is get on with the business of the city.”