L.A. ELECTIONS : Races for 2 Council Seats Come Down to Wire : Voters today will decide the outcome in the 5th and 10th districts. Also on the ballot is a measure to raise taxes to pay for two new police stations.

Los Angeles voters today will decide the outcome of two hard-fought City Council races and a ballot measure to raise property taxes to pay for a pair of new police stations.

Election officials expect an 18% turnout citywide, with a larger showing in the districts with council races on the ballot.

In the 5th District City Council race, Barbara Yaroslavsky, a 47-year-old community activist, is trying to gain the council seat last held by her husband, Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky.

Despite her edge in name recognition, Yaroslavsky is fighting to overcome the highly competitive candidacy of Michael Feuer, 36, former head of a legal services agency. Feuer came in first during the April primary, gaining 40% of the vote to Yaroslavsky’s 27%.

The 5th District includes Westwood, Fairfax, Bel-Air, Sherman Oaks and parts of Van Nuys.

The city’s 10th District council race pits Councilman Nate Holden, 65, who has served on the council since 1987, against attorney Stan Sanders, 52, a former city parks commissioner.

Holden, a veteran lawmaker with a reputation as a maverick, has been vexed by charges that he sexually harassed two former City Hall employees and had the city pay his legal tab in connection with a lawsuit filed by one of them.

Holden has denied any impropriety and received the endorsements of a number of women lawmakers, including U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles) and Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke.

Sanders has had his problems too. During the race, two ethics enforcement agencies opened investigations into allegations that he had used money from his 1993 mayor’s race to pay private debts stemming from his law practice.

Sanders also has denied any wrongdoing and has picked up the endorsement of former Mayor Tom Bradley, who once represented the 10th District. The district straddles the Santa Monica Freeway and includes the Crenshaw area and Koreatown.

In the primary, Holden received 46% of the vote, Sanders 42%.

City voters also will decide two ballot measures. The police facilities construction measure, known as Proposition 1, needs a two-thirds vote to win. If approved, the measure will cost the average household an estimated 79 cents a month in additional property taxes. Opponents say the measure is a waste of money.

A second measure, Proposition 2, would streamline procedures for resolving misconduct cases against Los Angeles Police Department officers. No organized opposition to this highly technical measure has surfaced.

Two other races are also on the Los Angeles-area ballot. One involves the contest for District 5 of the Los Angeles Unified Board of Education. Lucia V. Rivera, a longtime parent volunteer in the schools, is running against teacher David Tokofsky, who is backed by the teachers union. District 5 includes the Eastside and the eastern part of the San Fernando Valley.

The other local race is for the Los Angeles Community College Board of Trustees, Office No. 1. The contestants are Gloria Romero, a university professor, and businessman David Kessler. The candidates are seeking to fill the vacancy created by former trustee Wally Knox’s election to the state Assembly.

Meanwhile, voters in the 59th Assembly District go to the polls in a special election to fill a seat vacated by Richard Mountjoy, now a state senator.

The race had been closely watched for its impact on the state Assembly speakership fight. Republicans believed that winning the seat would help them oust Assembly Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco) and take control of the lower house for the first time in more than two decades.

But Monday, state Assemblywoman Doris Allen (R-Cypress) was elected Speaker with help from Brown and the Assembly’s 38 other Democratic lawmakers, prompting cries of “slick maneuvering” from Republican stalwarts.

GOP candidate Bob Margett, an Arcadia councilman, is expected to score an easy victory over Democrat Brent A. Decker in the 59th District race. The district includes all or part of Arcadia, Claremont, Covina, Duarte, Glendora, La Verne, Monrovia, Pomona and San Dimas.