Recall Campaign Jolts Glendora

Glendora has a reputation as a folksy community. A place renowned for its bougainvillea vines, old-style downtown and antique shops.

High school basketball, and bears and deer wandering into town are what usually count for excitement.

But a recall campaign against three City Council members has jolted the once sleepy town into the political fast lane.

By a simple majority, Mayor John Harrold and councilmen Richard Jacobs and Paul “Sonny” Marshall could be ousted from office Tuesday in the community of 49,415, set in the foothills 27 miles east of Los Angeles.

The three are advocates of slow growth in a 19.5-square-mile city traditionally favorable to developers of upscale homes in its foothills.

Glendora Citizens for Responsible Government accuses the three of abusing their power since becoming the governing majority on the five-member council last spring.

“It’s a sad mess they’ve made of the city,” said Bob Kuhn, a former mayor and recall advocate. “They kicked out dozens of volunteer city commissioners to make way for their cronies. They fired a popular city manager and secretly hired a city attorney.”

The recall group has raised more than $200,000 in its effort to oust the three men, making for plenty of lawn signs and mailers. That is nearly 10 times as much as the incumbents have garnered.

Art Ludwik, one of the owners of Glendora-based Rainbird Sprinkler Manufacturing Corp., and his wife have contributed and loaned the recall campaign about $80,000.

“The same arrogance and brashness that led 7,400 registered voters to sign the recall petition has led to a broad range of contributors to give to the campaign,” said Doug Tessitor, the recall committee’s spokesman.

Harrold, Jacobs and Marshall, however, say the recall is driven by a small group of development-friendly leaders.

“This is a recall election engineered by an arrogant elitist ruling class from their country club,” said Jacobs, a retired professor of environmental studies at Cal Poly Pomona.

Jacobs doesn’t like his chances in the election. “It is a beautiful test,” he said. “I think they are going to win. Money does win elections.”

On their anti-recall Web site, the three categorize their critics as “The Fat Cats” and “The Sore Losers.” They warn: “Don’t Let Wealthy Developers and Special Interests Buy Glendora’s City Council.” The three portray themselves as the protectors of the foothills that have gradually disappeared as homes climbed up the canyons in recent years. They also seek to capitalize on the city’s class and geographic divides.

Most of the recall campaign contributors, Jacobs said, live in the wealthy foothills, home to gated communities and the country club. He said those people for years ignored residents south of Alosta Avenue, now named Route 66.

That kind of divisiveness is exactly why the three have to go, Tessitor said.

“Rather than bringing the community together, they are trying to tear it apart,” he said. “I’m not a member of the country club nor are most people involved in the recall.”

Planning Commissioner Ken Herman is making a bid for Harrold’s seat, former Judge Eugene Osko and business executive Gary Clifford are vying for Jacobs’ seat, and Azusa Pacific University basketball Coach Cliff Hamlow hopes to replace Marshall. Herman, Clifford and Hamlow are endorsed by the recall committee.

Nearly 24,000 registered voters are eligible to cast ballots to replace one, two or all three council members in the first recall election in city history.

Incorporated in 1911, the “Pride of the Foothills” was a quaint town surrounded by citrus groves until the 1950s, when large residential developments began to spring up.

As land became scarce in the 1990s, controversy emerged over development.

Then homeowner Robert Gagne sued the city for violating his civil rights, claiming it illegally allowed a house in the foothills on a too-small lot above his home. That suit, settled when the city paid Gagne $800,000, further made development a hot-button issue.

Harrold and Jacobs won council seats in March 1999. The next year, they opposed a retail development, Glendora Marketplace, which includes Home Depot, Sam’s Club and other stores.

With one of the five council members recusing himself, the council deadlocked 2-2 on the project, slated for an area known as the old strawberry patch.

Harrold and Jacobs dissented, claiming it was too close to a neighborhood and would be better used as a park. Shortly afterward, voters approved the project in a citywide referendum by a 2-1 margin.

Although the referendum passed, Harrold and Jacobs got a new ally on the City Council when Marshall was elected last March.

In the wake of that victory, Kuhn said, the three became brash and rude toward opponents. They passed an ordinance last May to replace many longtime city commissioners--people who had volunteered for years, he said.

“I can understand them wanting like-minded planning commissioners, but some of these commissions are far from political,” he said.

Kuhn complains that the three councilmen fired the city manager, Gary Napper, and charges that they violated the state open meeting law by hiring a new city attorney after meeting with him privately.

Recall supporters say the three have created a crisis of confidence in Glendora that makes the community less attractive to businesses.

Harrold said they never fired a single commissioner--just asked them to reapply and comply with a new ethics code. They did remove the city manager, he said, but that is not unusual in local government. He said they chose a new city attorney in public in compliance with the law.

“When Jimmy Hahn or George Bush were elected,” he said, “no one said they couldn’t appoint who they wanted.”