Candidates Queue Up to Vie for Council Seat : Thousand Oaks: Filing begins Monday for those hoping to replace Schillo in special election. Five have confirmed they will run.

City Clerk Nancy Dillon’s busy schedule Monday leaves little doubt that the field for the vacant fifth seat on the Thousand Oaks City Council will be a crowded one.

On that first day of filing for the special June election, Dillon already has appointments with five candidates for hourlong meetings to explain campaign rules and regulations.

She also has an appointment scheduled Tuesday and another Wednesday, and she fully expects more visits from candidates before the March 10 filing deadline.

“It happens all the time,” Dillon said. “A lot of people will sit back and watch and see who takes out papers, and then decide.”

Among those who have already confirmed their candidacies are Planning Commissioner Forrest Frields; dentist Greg Cole, who spent the most money in the fall council campaign; Mike Markey, the fourth-place finisher in the November election for three seats; self-employed businessman and council critic Nick Quidwai, and carwash owner Lance Winslow.

Former supervisorial candidate Trudi Loh, an attorney who spent $133,000 and lost to Frank Schillo by less than 3 percentage points in the November election, is leaning toward running, although she said she will wait until midweek to make an announcement.

Loh said she has held a few meetings with community members, including one last weekend, to gauge public interest in her possible candidacy. “The response has been positive,” she said, “and that’s the direction I’m leaning.”

Former Supervisor Madge Schaefer, frequently mentioned as a likely candidate, said Friday that she is not running.

Still on the fence are November candidates Lee Laxdal and David Hare. Laxdal, a former city councilman, said he fears that the election will be expensive, a factor that is making him carefully consider his candidacy.

“This is going to be a big spending orgy again,” Laxdal said. “I can see people spending $30,000 again, and that is just a prostitution of the way politics had previously been carried out in Thousand Oaks.”

He said he still has some bills to pay from his $9,500 November campaign. The 16 fall candidates spent more than $210,000 combined.

Hare, who ran on a slate with Councilwoman Elois Zeanah in November and came in seventh, said he will decide by Monday whether to run. At first, he said, he had little interest in the campaign.

“It’s going to be a dirty, nasty and very expensive election,” Hare said. “Someone has to put a stop to it.”

The fifth seat is vacant because Schillo left the council to take his position on the Board of Supervisors in January.

The seat is considered the panel’s swing vote, because council members Andy Fox and Judy Lazar tend to vote together, as do Zeanah and Mayor Jaime Zukowski.

In January, the four deadlocked on the issue of the special election itself. (Either a tie or a majority vote was needed to schedule the election.) And earlier this week, the council split, 2-2, on approval of a flood control project in North Ranch after five hours of discussion.

But even as some predict the June 6 election will be as expensive as the fall campaign, some candidates said they hope to keep spending to a minimum.

“It’s my intent to lead off with a proposal for campaign reform,” Loh said. “I have some specific proposals I’m going to make.”

Cole, who spent $38,000 in the fall, said he plans to run his spring campaign differently.

“I probably will not spend as much this election,” he said. “I’ll probably do more grass-roots.”

Markey’s campaign manager, John Powers, said the Compton police detective, who received $11,000 in contributions from North Ranch businessman Charles Probst in the last campaign, will not actively seek special-interest money.

“He’s gotten a lot of $5 and $10 donations,” Powers said. “He does not want to see it be an expensive race.”

Up until last week, Markey was undecided about the race, Powers said.

“I really pushed him,” he said.

Winslow, a 30-year-old entrepreneur who came in ninth in November, said he is eager for the campaign to start.

“When the election was over I was bored because I had nothing to do,” Winslow said.

But the staff in the city clerk’s office hardly feel that way.

They spent 12 frantic days updating the city’s election codes in time for Monday’s filings, a process that is usually spaced out over a year. And the memory of November’s election is still fresh in Dillon’s mind.

“I feel like I just finished,” she said.