Hahn Finished a Disappointing Third in Valley

San Fernando Valley residents voted for former Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa as often as they did for conservative businessman Steve Soboroff, according to an analysis of election returns by The Times.

Villaraigosa took 28% and Soboroff 28.1%. But James K. Hahn, who will face Villaraigosa in a runoff in June, took just 15.9% of the Valley’s vote.

The importance of the Valley to both campaigns was illustrated Wednesday by the candidates’ appearances in that part of the city. And the analysis of the vote Tuesday night demonstrates not just why the Valley is politically important but also why some of the conventional wisdom about the Valley in this race may be mistaken.

Hahn’s relatively poor showing in the Valley was a disappointment to two of his most prominent Latino supporters, state Assemblyman Tony Cardenas and City Councilman Alex Padilla, both from the northeast Valley.

The analysis shows that Villaraigosa prevailed in the central Valley, while Soboroff was the favorite along the borders of the Valley.

Xavier Flores, treasurer of the San Fernando Valley chapter of the Mexican American Political Assn., said the Valley’s Latino elected officials miscalculated the will of their constituents.

“They want people to believe that because they’re with them, the Latino community’s with them, but I think yesterday’s vote proves otherwise,” Flores said.

Separate Los Angeles Times exit polling showed a second strong trend in voting Tuesday: White voters outnumbered Latinos by more than 5 to 1 in the Valley, despite new census figures showing Latinos nearly even with whites in the area’s population.

The wide gap between Latinos’ share of the population and their share of the electorate reflects a phenomenon found well beyond the Valley: The political clout of Latinos across the Southland has lagged well behind their explosive growth in the population at large, experts say. Part of the lag is due to the distinctive youth of the Latino population overall, meaning many are not old enough to vote.

The sharp disparity between population and electoral share on Tuesday came even as a record number of Latinos turned out at the polls throughout Los Angeles and helped put Latino mayoral candidate Villaraigosa into the June runoff.

Citywide, Latinos accounted for 20% of the vote, up from 15% in the municipal election four years ago, according to a Los Angeles Times survey of voters as they left the polls.

In the Valley, Latinos made up 13% of the voters, up from 9% in the April 1997 election. The Times surveyed 1,208 voters in the Valley as they left the polls.

The survey has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points for the Valley overall, and 7 percentage points for Valley Latinos.

But Latinos outnumber whites in the citywide population and are just behind whites in the Valley, according to 2000 census figures. With births outpacing immigration as the main cause of the surge in Latino population, many are too young to vote. Many others are immigrants ineligible to vote.

“What we see is potential clout,” said Jorge Garcia, a Chicano studies professor and dean of the Cal State Northridge College of Humanities.

To Garcia and other Latino scholars, the lag between population and electoral strength has consequences for the quality of life in some impoverished and predominantly Latino areas such as Arleta and Pacoima in the northeast Valley.

When it comes to litter, abandoned cars or streets in disrepair, elected officials can afford to disregard “the interests of those who are not voting,” Garcia said. “There’s a real impact here.”

And that, he said, is unlikely to change, even if homeowner and business groups are successful in their drive for Valley secession from Los Angeles.

“Some parts of the Valley will continue to be ignored--whether it’s part of Los Angeles or its own city,” he said.

“The irony is the phenomenon of a very large turnout of Latinos in this race,” said David Diaz, also a Chicano studies professor at CSUN.

A Times computer-assisted analysis of Tuesday’s election returns reflected a Valley electorate sharply divided along ethnic and geographical lines.

Soboroff was the favorite in the seven predominantly white districts around the southern, western and northern Valley rim, from Sherman Oaks and Encino through Woodland Hills, Chatsworth and Northridge to Sunland and Tujunga in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains.

Villaraigosa won the seven more heavily Latino districts of the northeast and central Valley, including Arleta, Pacoima, Sylmar, North Hollywood, Van Nuys and Reseda.

Overall, 53% of Valley Latinos favored Villaraigosa, followed by 16% for Soboroff, 13% for Rep. Xavier Becerra--the other Latino in the mayoral race--and 10% for Hahn, according to Times exit polling.

State Sen. Richard Alarcon said the election results show that Latino voters “will vote for the person who best reflects their issues. Latino voters are like anybody else.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Valley Favors Soboroff, Villaraigosa

A Times computer analysis of election returns Tuesday shows that Valley voters favored businessman Steve Soboroff and former state Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa.

Which candidate carried which district

Computer analysis: DOUG SMITH

NOTE: Absentee ballots not included.

NOTE: Tabular data retained in Mediasphere graphic.