Parks Takes Aim at Finance Reform

Emboldened by her victory over a big-money rival, slow-growth advocate Linda Parks said her first priorities as a new member of the Ventura County Board of Supervisors will be to call for campaign finance reform and put the brakes on the Ahmanson Ranch housing project.

Even before Parks takes office in January, Supervisor Steve Bennett said Wednesday he plans to revive the campaign finance issue at the supervisors’ Tuesday meeting. Parks and Bennett say local fund-raising records shattered in this week’s primary election illustrate a need for reform.

“My opponent spent a half-million dollars attacking me,” Parks said. “We really need to even the playing field. There are some major issues at the county level, and reform will reduce the ability of big money to influence those decisions.”

Action is necessary, Bennett said, to prevent a repeat of the $600,000 race between Parks and millionaire businessman Randy Hoffman and the record $1.5-million campaign for district attorney.

Although outspent by Hoffman 5 to 1, Parks topped the former technology executive 53% to 47% at the polls to win the Thousand Oaks-based 2nd District office.

In the race for district attorney, veteran prosecutor Greg Totten won by a 2-to-1 margin despite Deputy Dist. Atty. Ron Bamieh’s expenditure of $1 million of his father’s money.

Bennett said he will propose next week that contributions be limited to $500 per individual and that voluntary spending maximums be set. A similar plan failed to gain much support when Bennett first announced it last fall.

But Bennett said he hopes Tuesday’s election and modifications to his earlier proposal will make the board more receptive.

“Even though those two won, how many good candidates who don’t have the political capital to withstand that kind of attack are going to throw their hat in the ring?” he said.

“A lot of people would feel like they couldn’t stand up to a half-million-dollar campaign, and that deprives the voters of more quality candidates to choose from.”

If Bennett is rebuffed by the other supervisors, Parks said she will support a reform measure once she is sworn in.

“I actually wrote Thousand Oaks’ first campaign reform law,” said Parks, a city councilwoman. “It’s time to have a county law on the books.”

In a second supervisorial race, embattled incumbent Judy Mikels edged a law enforcement-backed challenger in her quest for a third term. On Wednesday, Mikels said she stands firm in her opposition to an expanded retirement package for sheriff’s deputies.

“They threw everything at me that they possibly could, and I still won,” Mikels said. “They couldn’t do it. They couldn’t unseat me. So, no, I’m not scared into submission.”

Mikels took 51% of the vote, with Moorpark fraud investigator John Lane 708 votes behind in unofficial results.

About 10,000 absentee ballots won’t be counted until Friday, but Lane said he does not expect the election’s outcome to change.

Mikels said the close call is not a signal that voters want her to mellow her brusque style or sever ties to developers. She attributed Lane’s strong performance in the Simi Valley-based 4th District to voters’ empathy for law enforcement after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Lane is a retired Los Angeles police officer.

“I just think the public safety unions worked it really hard with their uniforms on,” she said. “The whole ‘America’s Heroes’ trick worked for him.”

Sheriff’s deputies withdrew their support for Mikels after she refused to approve a costly retirement benefits upgrade sought in labor negotiations. The union backed Lane’s campaign with money and manpower, sending throngs of deputies and firefighters to walk precincts on his behalf.

Lane also targeted constituents who felt stung by Mikels’ personal style. And he offered himself as a slow-growth alternative to Mikels, who supports the 3,050-home Ahmanson Ranch development and received campaign contributions from billionaire developer David Murdock as well as mining and business interests.

Lane, devastated by his brother’s death from a long illness on the day before the election, was gracious toward his opponent on Wednesday.

“I’m going to focus on my family,” he said. “I wish her well with all the major problems this county is facing. I really do hope she is able to bring peace in this settlement with the deputies.”

The deputies must now resume talks with a Board of Supervisors that includes Mikels. If negotiations drag into next year, deputies will have to contend with Parks, whom they also targeted for defeat.

Union President Glen Kitzmann said his group doesn’t plan to change its strategy or scale back any demands. He maintained that supervisors, not deputies, are to blame for stalled talks and said there is little he can do.

“We’re always willing to work with whoever’s there,” he said. “Both Judy Mikels and Linda Parks portrayed themselves to the public as being strong public safety advocates. Now we’ll see whether that was just talk.”

In a fourth contested office, Assistant Recorder Phil Schmit will most likely face Oxnard City Clerk Daniel Martinez in a November runoff. Schmit, endorsed by retiring Clerk-Recorder Richard Dean, led a pack of six candidates with 34% of the vote.

Martinez squeezed into second place with 20%, 284 votes ahead of county Board of Education trustee Yvonne Gallegos Bodle. Bodle did not concede on Wednesday, saying she will wait until all absentee votes have been counted.

Turnout was the lowest ever for a gubernatorial primary, election officials said. Just 30% of the county’s 385,000 registered voters went to the polls.

Parks’ arrival on the Board of Supervisors could trigger other changes on key board decisions.

Parks is fervently opposed to the Ahmanson Ranch development in the Simi Hills. Supervisors approved the project in 1992, but it has been delayed by more than a dozen lawsuits.

Discovery of a flower thought to be extinct and a threatened frog in 1999 further stalled the project.

Supervisors are now considering a new environmental study on whether the project can be built without harming the threatened species.

If that hurdle is cleared, Bennett said he believes more review of the project’s effect on traffic may be needed.

“I want to follow the process, but it’s likely that traffic will remain as an issue that needs additional study,” Bennett said.

Parks agrees.

“The traffic report is grossly inadequate,” she said. “We’ll see if I have an opportunity to vote on it.”

Until then, Parks will pursue her first choice--trying to persuade developer Washington Mutual to sell the land for permanent preservation as open space.

Although Washington Mutual has expressed no interest, Parks called selling the acreage a “win-win” solution.

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Times staff writer Daryl Kelley contributed to this report.