Santa Paula Council Race Is All Business as Usual

This town likes to say its downtown is frozen in time in the 1950s.

Its election issues are straight out of the past too, but the more recent past.

In 1992, the pivotal issue in the City Council race was revitalizing the moribund local economy. In 1994, downtown restoration and job creation dominated the campaign.

This year, with the recent loss of 175 jobs at a lingerie factory, the imminent closure of one of the town’s two major grocery stores and little tangible evidence of redevelopment, things are no different.

“This is a very poor community and it’s nobody’s fault but our own,” said Howard Bolton, president of the Chamber of Commerce. “For this town to survive we have to move forward.”

The perennial topic of economic development--or the lack of it--is emphasized by all four candidates vying for two council seats. Well-known real estate broker Jim Garfield and longtime restaurateur Gabriella Araiza Reeves are challenging incumbents Robin Sullivan and Al Urias.

“The town has deteriorated tremendously in the last 10 years,” Garfield said.

Garfield, 59, who was named Santa Paula Citizen of the Year in 1986, calls the attraction of new businesses to the city his No. 1 priority.

He emphasized that an expanded tax base is essential to increasing support for such city services as the underfinanced police force. He wants to appoint a panel to look for new businesses.

Sullivan, an attorney and two-term chamber president who stresses her relationship with the business community, agrees that broadening the economic base is crucial.

“Everything has to be looked at from an economic standpoint,” she said.

Urias, seeking his sixth term in office, said he is running largely to see through several projects that have dominated the council’s agenda in the last few years.

That includes downtown redevelopment, which is expected to finally get underway this year. That may be the key to attracting more merchants, he said.

“I can’t buy a suit of clothes in town, a decent shirt, a decent tie,” Urias grumbled at a recent candidates forum.

Reeves, known as “Gabie” to patrons of her Mexican restaurant, is quick to note that her business has grown even while the local economy has declined over the last 15 years. She takes a different tack on how to improve the economy, with the campaign slogan “Unity for economic vitality.”

“We need to unite,” said Reeves, another former chamber president. “It’s 80% Latinos here, and we need to be able to work together in order for the economy to grow.”

Long-simmering divisions became more accentuated in the past year when huge crowds turned out to debate whether to use a portion of redevelopment money for a new low-income housing complex or to improve existing housing conditions. Many said that farm workers, most of them Latinos who sometimes live two or three families to a residence, would be displaced if landlords were forced to spend too much improving their housing.

If money is a measure of political muscle, Sullivan and Garfield are far ahead of their opponents.

Sullivan is the largest money raiser with about $6,780 so far. Garfield is a close second, with $5,768. Urias is a distant third with just over $2,000, while Reeves intends to spend less than $1,000.

With election day drawing closer, candidates have sought to stake out moderate positions in efforts to appeal to Anglos and the ever-increasing political clout of Latinos among the city’s 10,499 registered voters.

Urias, for instance, told the audience at a recent political forum about his experience at segregated Santa Paula elementary schools, but he flatly denied the existence of present-day racial discord.

“I have not seen these big rifts we’re talking about,” he said.

Garfield is an influential member of Better Living in Time, which successfully opposed the housing project and championed a municipal program dubbed “Project Clean and Safe” that aims to bring aging residences up to code.

Indeed, he distributes campaign materials in a garbage bag adorned with the slogan “For a clean and safe Santa Paula, together we can make a difference.”

Although Garfield himself noted that the BLIT proposal caused divisiveness between the city’s Anglos and Latinos, he said that he is a member of a recently formed group called the “We can work it out lunch bunch” that is intended to form a bridge between the communities.

“This community will not be a good place for any of us to live unless it’s a good place for all of us to live,” he said. “The problems in this community with cleanliness and safety have nothing to do with a particular race.”

Sullivan, a BLIT supporter, is reaching out to Latinos in her campaign materials by pointing out that she has a dual Mexican and American heritage and tracing her ancestry south of the border.

“The community as a whole wants to be unified and considers themselves unified,” she said, dismissing racial divisiveness as a phony issue. “It is being brought to the forefront for a special political reason that isn’t necessarily reflective of the community as a whole.”

Reeves, who said she was asked to run by Latinos, is reluctant to discuss the issue at length for fear of alienating voters she hopes will be drawn to her low-cost campaign.

“I do not take sides,” said Reeves, who is married to an Anglo. “I think my chances are very good at being able to work with both sides.”

Overshadowed by the frenetic council campaign are two candidates vying for the elected post of city clerk.

They are Elizabeth Noriega Ruiz, a former deputy city clerk, and businessman Victor Salas, who made an unsuccessful run at a council seat two years ago.

The pair are competing for the $300-a-month job, reluctantly held by Norm Wilkinson, the public works director who inherited the job from departed City Administrator Arnold Dowdy. Dowdy was appointed to the position when the elected clerk left the city for another job.

The other elected post up for grabs, that of city treasurer, has no candidates seeking the post.

Present Treasurer Robin Shute, the lone name on the ballot, suddenly decided to return to her New Mexico hometown and announced her resignation effective Oct. 31. Barring a surprise write-in candidate, Shute is expected to win reelection, meaning she will have to resign a second time, Wilkinson said.

The electoral gymnastics related to both posts in recent years are the reason the city is again asking voters to make the positions appointive rather than elective, despite the defeat two years ago of a measure on the city clerk position. Garfield, Reeves and Urias are in favor of the measure; Sullivan is opposed.

If voters approve the measures next month, the successful city clerk candidate would serve his or her four-year term before the post reverts to an appointive position, Wilkinson said.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Santa Paula City Council, City Clerk

Four candidates are running for two council seats, while two candidates are contesting the vacant city clerk position. The shaky local economy and racial divisions within the community top the list of concerns. Incumbents Robin Sullivan and Al Urias are both seeking reelection.

City Council candidates

Jim Garfield

Age: 59

Occupation: Real estate broker

Education: Attended Fenn College in Ohio

Background: Garfield is an outspoken participant in Better Living in Time, a community group that opposed a low-income housing project and proposed city efforts to clean up blighted residential areas earlier this year, igniting a controversy in the city. A 32-year resident, Garfield was named Santa Paula Citizen of the Year in 1986 and Realtor of the Year in 1988. He is former president of the local Chamber of Commerce, Meals on Wheels and American Heart Assn. He is married with two grown children.

Issues: Garfield supports greater municipal economic development efforts to attract businesses to the city. He favors a new code enforcement program to eliminate blight. He believes that the city must focus more attention on race relations.

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Robin Sullivan

Age: 47

Occupation: Attorney

Education: Law degree from Ventura College of Law

Background: Sullivan is seeking her second council term. A former two-term Chamber of Commerce president, she is active in several business groups and is a founding member of the Downtown Improvement Group, an organization that supports downtown revitalization. Most recently, she served on a subcommittee of the community group Better Living in Time that raised money for a new police dog. She is married.

Issues: Sullivan’s focus is improving the poor economy, tarnished image and fractured unity of the community. She opposes the Toland Road Landfill expansion. She supports Project Clean & Safe, a municipal program to clean up residential blight proposed by Better Living in Time.

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Gabriella Reeves

Age: 63

Occupation: Restaurant owner

Education: High school graduate

Background: The 43-year Santa Paula resident is a past Planning Commission member, former Chamber of Commerce president and past director of the city’s Housing Authority. She is a board member of the Boys & Girls Club and Santa Clara Valley Hospice. She is married with four grown children.

Issues: Reeves said her bid for office is an attempt to forge unity in the racially diverse city and she believes that the “oft times cantankerous” City Council should set an example. She supports finishing proposed downtown improvements quickly to attract tourists and improve the local economy.

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Al Urias

Age: 72

Occupation: Retired police officer and community college official

Education: Bachelor’s degrees in police science and administration from Sacramento State College

Background: Raised in Santa Paula, the 20-year City Council veteran is seeking a sixth term. He is a member of the Ventura Regional Sanitation District board of directors and the Ventura County Economic Development Collaborative. He is married with five grown children.

Issues: Urias said he is running again to ensure the city’s redevelopment efforts come to fruition, so that residents have more jobs and blight is replaced by updated housing. He stresses efforts to eliminate divisions within the community. He favors retaining a municipal police force.

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City clerk candidates

Elizabeth Noriega Ruiz

Age: 41

Occupation: Transit information operator

Education: Attended Ventura College

Background: Noriega Ruiz was deputy city clerk in Santa Paula for four years until 1991. She is a past member of the Southern California City Clerks Assn. and a second-year participant in Continuing Education for Public Officials.

Issues: Ruiz believes that an elected city clerk position provides the independence from municipal officials necessary for the job. She opposes a measure on the ballot that would make the city clerk an appointed post, noting that Santa Paulans rejected a similar measure two years ago.

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Victor Salas Sr.

Age: 64

Occupation: Retired engineer and owner of a pest control manufacturing company

Education: Associate’s degree in engineering from Ventura College

Background: A former seven-year member of the Santa Paula Planning Commission, Salas is also a former president of the Santa Paula Union High School District. He is a founding member and president of the Santa Paula Mexican-American Chamber of Commerce.

Issues: Salas believes a city clerk is more than simply a “record keeper,” seeing the position as a liaison between the municipal administration and residents. He envisions taking an active role in assisting the city manager in administrative duties.