Election Tips Balance of Power in San Fernando

Maribel De La Torre, the top vote-getter this week in the San Fernando City Council race, will likely become part of a new majority on the council that favors preserving the small-town atmosphere of the blue-collar city of 25,000 in the northeast San Fernando Valley.

De La Torre will join her sister, Cindy Montanez, on the five-member panel, making them what many believe are the only siblings elected to serve simultaneously on a city council in the county.

The winner of the second open seat in Tuesday’s election was Jose Hernandez, who was seeking his third term.

The 70-year-old Cal State Northridge Chicano studies professor, who has twice served as mayor, has sided with Montanez on most issues in the past few years.

Hernandez, Montanez and De La Torre are expected to unite in support of preserving the city’s Latino flavor and small-town feel over bringing in major retailers and creating a bustling downtown. The old majority, formed by Richard Ramos and Beverly DiTomaso, who do not come up for reelection until 2003, and Mayor Silverio Robledo, who was defeated on Tuesday, favored the latter.

“Development will definitely take a different direction with the new council,” Robledo said. Hernandez, a strong supporter of De La Torre, said the old council’s drive to bring in outside retailers caused it to overlook other important issues in the mostly Latino city. “There needs to be a balance between development and social and human needs and there wasn’t,” Hernandez said. “I think there will be more of a balance now. Maribel understands that.”

Much like her sister, the 30-year-old De La Torre, an independent mortgage broker, campaigned with promises of nurturing San Fernando’s historic roots and expanding its cultural facilities.

The sisters, who have four other siblings, grew up in San Fernando in a family of activists.

In 1999, several members of the Montanez family chained themselves to trees along San Fernando Road in an unsuccessful effort to stop the city from cutting them down.

In 1993, Cindy Montanez and another sister, Norma, participated in a 14-day hunger strike that led to the expansion of the Chicano studies program at UCLA, where Cindy was a student.