CYPRESS : 7 Candidates File for Council Election

Seven candidates for the City Council filed before the closing 5 p.m. deadline Thursday, the city clerk’s office reported.

Three council seats might be vacant after a recall election Nov. 7 aimed at Mayor Cecilia L. Age, Councilman Walter K. Bowman and Councilwoman Gail H. Kerry.

The ballot will ask voters if a council member should be removed from office. If a majority of those voting say yes, that council seat becomes vacant. It would then be filled by the candidate getting the most votes for that seat.

Those filing to fill Kerry’s council seat were Tim Keenan, 42, and Jerry Sharber, 48, both owners of businesses.

Seeking Age’s seat are Regan Smith, 45, a homemaker and businesswoman, and Burt Cheifer, a sales representative whose age was not available.

Filing to fill Bowman’s seat were Paula English, 46, a business owner; Lynda Lacayo, 50, a reporter and businesswoman, and K. Gina Restivo, 36, an attorney and accountant.

Under state law, the recall election was required after opponents of the three council members succeeded in getting enough signatures of registered voters on petitions calling for their ouster.

The recall campaign was triggered by the council members’ vote last September for a carpet-distribution warehouse in the Valley View Street area. The warehouse would be an environmental disaster because of increased noise and pollution, opponents say.

The council members, in their rebuttal of the recall effort, have said that the political reaction in unwarranted. The council members all have defended their vote on the warehouse, saying it would bring in hundreds of thousands of tax dollars to the city.

The three council members also have contended that city studies show the warehouse would have minimal effect on the environment.

Kathy Simcox, a spokeswoman for the pro-recall committees, said that candidates Smith, English and Sharber have been active in the organized opposition to the warehouse.

In addition to the recall, the Nov. 7 city ballot also will contain several advisory-vote questions to gauge public opinion about parks and other community projects.