Totten Routs Bamieh for D.A.; Hoffman, Parks in Tight Race

Veteran administrator Greg Totten won a commanding victory Tuesday night over prosecutor Ron Bamieh in the race for Ventura County district attorney, ending a bitter contest that shattered local campaign spending records.

“This shows that the electorate believes law enforcement is doing a good job, and that includes the district attorney’s office,” Totten said to supporters’ wild cheers, with late returns showing him with a 2-1 lead over Bamieh. “And it shows that they value experience and integrity. That was our message throughout this campaign and that is the kind of office we are going to run.”

Hosting what was supposed to be a celebratory victory party at the Pierpont Inn in Ventura, Bamieh said he was “dumbfounded” by the returns.

But Bamieh stopped short of conceding.

“I’m not happy,” Bamieh said as the numbers flashed on a nearby TV screen. “But there’s no quit in me right now.”

Millionaire businessman Randy Hoffman and Thousand Oaks Councilwoman Linda Parks were locked in a tight contest for the Thousand Oaks supervisor’s seat. Hoffman took an early edge in returns but Parks overtook him slightly as more votes were counted.

Supervisor Judy Mikels led in her quest for a third term in the Simi Valley-based 4th district. But her rival, Moorpark fraud investigator John Lane, was within striking distance with a long night ahead.

In the county clerk-recorder’s race, Asst. Recorder Phil J. Schmit was cruising with a comfortable lead at the top of a six-candidate field. Schmit was endorsed by incumbent Clerk-Recorder Richard Dean, who is retiring at the end of the year.

Totten’s commanding lead came as election officials predicted that the number of voters casting ballots in the primary could be the lowest in years. Dean said turnout could rival a 33% historic low set in 1994, another off-year election.

Bamieh attempted to win voters over with a costly cable TV advertising blitz that started late last year. Bamieh’s ads ran frequently as he tried to overcome Totten’s endorsement by virtually the entire law enforcement community and the candidates’ boss, Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury.

But that strategy appeared to backfire with some voters, who said they were turned off by Bamieh’s relentless ad campaign. Voters also said they were concerned about the fat-wallet campaign bankrolled by the candidate’s father, wealthy San Mateo businessman and frequent GOP contributor Sam Bamieh.

“I have heard the Bamieh TV ads for months,” said Adrienne Moore, 71, of Westlake. “I just got sick of hearing them. That’s entirely too much money to put into winning a race.” Tuesday capped an electoral season marked by record spending in two county races and by accusations of sleazy tactics.

With no limits on campaign contributions, spending in the district attorney’s race swelled to $1.5 million this week, while the Hoffman-Parks battle approached $600,000.

The fight for district attorney was the first contested race for that office since 1978 and was the most expensive ever for a single county seat.

Bamieh, a 36-year-old senior deputy district attorney, ran on a platform of bringing change to the prosecutors’ office. He touted his trial experience and called his opponent a bureaucrat unwilling to fix problems in how the office handles criminal cases.

Totten, the 47-year-old chief assistant district attorney, vowed to improve on his boss’ tough-on-crime legacy by hiring more minorities and seeking grants for new programs. He won early support from Bradbury, Sheriff Bob Brooks and every local police chief. Supporters described Totten as a proven leader with integrity and administrative experience.

But Totten had to put his endorsements up against Bamieh’s money.

Bamieh spent more than $1 million on mailers, signs and television and radio ads, as well as the services of a New York-based campaign advisor and pollster known for his work on U.S. Senate races.

In the final days of the campaign, Sam Bamieh made eight contributions totaling $262,000 to his son’s campaign pay for a flurry of last-minute ads.

Altogether, the candidate’s father donated $1,024,719, more than any single donor has ever given to a Ventura County race.

Totten raised less than half that amount, about $400,000, and spent much of it on television ads and mailers, some of which struck even his supporters as nasty and negative. Totten defended his tactics, saying the campaign had to respond to misleading ads aired by his rival.

Accusations of mudslinging were frequent during the race.

In mid-February, Totten called a news conference to criticize Bamieh for running a TV ad that featured a 72-year-old Santa Paula supporter who was convicted in 1989 of selling cocaine. Bamieh said he was unaware of the man’s criminal past.

Totten said the slip-up showed his opponent’s lack of judgment. Bamieh, however, said the publicity stunt made clear that Totten was willing to “destroy people’s lives” to gain his boss’ seat.

In Thousand Oaks, the contest to replace retiring Supervisor Frank Schillo was hard-fought and costly. The same divisions that have balkanized city politics for a decade reared their head during the campaign.

Parks, 45, hammered repeatedly on her record of opposing nearly all growth in the city and promised to fight the 3,050-home Ahmanson Ranch development at the county’s eastern fringe if elected.

She “walked the walk” while her opponent was only paying lip service in support of slow-growth policies to get elected, Parks told voters. She pounced on Hoffman’s contributions from developers and others in the construction industry as evidence that, once in office, Hoffman would support development that residents oppose.

Parks limited her contributions to $500 per individual and raised about $106,000 from retirees, attorneys, and slow-growth advocates. Hoffman, meanwhile, raised nearly five times that amount even though he announced his candidacy months after Parks.

As of this week, Hoffman had raised about $450,000 and was spending it as fast as it came in. Most of his contributions came from the Conejo Valley’s business elite, including $91,000 from Dole Foods CEO and Lake Sherwood developer David H. Murdock.

Hoffman, 48, sought to portray Parks as a divisive, single-issue politician who does not have the breadth to solve the complex problems that come before the Board of Supervisors.

Hoffman has emphasized his business credentials throughout the race, reminding audiences that he helped found Magellan Systems, a successful technology company. But those credentials were tarnished last month by news reports that one of his recent business ventures has teetered on bankruptcy and left a trail of debts.

In the Simi Valley supervisor’s contest, Mikels ran hard against Lane as she sought a third term. The incumbent said she was forced to raise more money than she had anticipated, about $117,000, because of Lane’s financial backing and endorsements by the county’s law enforcement unions

Lane raised about $90,000, largely through contributions from the deputies’ union and loans to himself.

The deputies and county firefighters backed Lane because Mikels has stood fast with the Board of Supervisors in refusing to grant the unions a costly increase in retirement benefits. In her previous two campaigns, the deputies had supported Mikels.

Mikels, 56, ran on her record as a fiscal conservative and a no-nonsense approach to county business. Lane, 54, positioned himself as a slow-growth advocate, criticizing Mikels for supporting the Ahmanson Ranch development and a highway-widening project in her district.

He drew support from environmentalists and slow-growth advocates, as well as Somis residents who don’t want California 118 near their homes widened.

Mikels did not believe her financial backing from business executives and developers, including $27,500 from Murdock, would hurt her standing with voters in the conservative district, which also includes Moorpark and Somis.

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Times staff writers Margaret Talev, Daryl Kelley and Jenifer Ragland contributed to this report.

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