ELECTIONS /THOUSAND OAKS CITY COUNCIL : Candidates Focus Campaigns on Fight Against Crime

If there is one thing the six candidates for the vacant seat on the Thousand Oaks City Council agree on, it is that the city’s remarkable record of public safety must be sustained.

Every candidate from the professional policeman to the carwash owner has his or her own approach on how to make a safe city safer. All talk of avoiding complacency and taking preventive measures. Never rest on your laurels, they caution.

Across the board, candidates give credit to the work of the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department, which provides deputies for Thousand Oaks. None of the six favor breaking the contract with the county to form a separate police department, saying they are satisfied with the department’s efforts.

Gearing up for the June 6 special election, the candidates distinguish themselves by offering ideas ranging from imposing curfews on teen-agers to hiring more deputies, but they never veer far from the basic message of fighting crime.

While the contest to fill Frank Schillo’s council seat--freed up by his election to the county Board of Supervisors last November--is likely to ultimately hinge more on where the candidates stand on development and growth issues, the candidates are wise enough to know that public safety is paramount to Thousand Oaks residents.

The city’s safety record lured people to the area in droves in the 1980s. In a 1994 attitude survey, Conejo Valley residents cited the low crime rate as the single most important factor in why they moved to Thousand Oaks.

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Residents boast of FBI statistics that showed Thousand Oaks to be one of the safest cities of its size in the country for the first six months of 1994, second only to the Buffalo suburb of Amherst Town.

And within Ventura County, Thousand Oaks was easily the safest large city during all of 1994, with a rate of 27.1 crimes per 1,000 residents, the bulk of them property crimes rather than violent crimes.

Residents guard their sanctuary zealously, painting over graffiti, working closely with sheriff’s deputies and Neighborhood Watch groups and hoping that crime does not overtake Thousand Oaks. Those who relocated here from other Los Angeles suburbs have adopted almost a mantra: “We just don’t want this to turn into another San Fernando Valley.�

Crime has been shown to be an effective issue for past campaigns in Thousand Oaks. Councilman Andy Fox, a Los Angeles County firefighter, made public safety his priority during the fall campaign. He was swept into office by an overwhelming vote, receiving nearly 700 more votes than incumbent Judy Lazar, and nearly 6,000 more votes than incumbent Elois Zeanah.

In the spring election season, two candidates are already giving top priority to public safety in their campaigns: attorney Trudi Loh and Mike Markey, a Compton homicide detective.

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Both want to push for early action in keeping local youths from joining gangs and getting into trouble.

“We have to invest more of our public safety dollars into prevention,� Loh said. “We have to reach these kids when they are very young, as soon as they are old enough to understand.�

She said she would combine city efforts with the school and park districts, and suggests a plan where schools would give class credit to both troubled and stable youths who maintain trails and do other environmental work.

Markey, who worked in a special gang unit in Compton from 1980 to 1982 before becoming homicide detective, said he would like to see Thousand Oaks expand its two part-time gang officers into full-time positions.

He also favors a 10 p.m. curfew for all young people under 18, to be incorporated into the municipal code along with a loitering law. The idea is one Markey first proposed in 1990, in his first of two unsuccessful bids for a council seat.

Markey said the law would keep teen-agers off the street and therefore out of gangs.

“If they are hard-core gang members, you could actually arrest them for loitering,� Markey said. Teen-agers on their way to and from dances or sporting events would not be stopped, he added.

“We’re not going to put every kid who is hanging out in jail,� Markey said. “This would be a tool.�

Markey’s suggestion drew a negative response from the campaign’s youngest candidate, mobile carwash owner Lance Winslow, 30, who is making his second bid for a council seat. Winslow came in ninth out of a field of 16 in last November’s council elections.

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“That’s well and good, but (Markey) works in Compton and there should be a curfew in Compton,� Winslow said. “I don’t know if we need a curfew in this town.

“Are the police going to stop and harass everybody, all the young people they see?� Winslow added. “That’s just general harassment. If the problem isn’t broken, don’t fix it. Don’t create laws that jeopardize people’s rights.�

John Ellis, an engineer and real estate broker making his first bid for a council seat, said he places great faith in policing decisions made by the Sheriff’s Department.

“I look to them quite frankly for advice on what programs will work,� Ellis said.

He said he would ease their workload by using volunteers for administrative tasks whenever necessary. Additionally, Ellis has a unique suggestion for lowering the cost of one outreach program he favors for youths, the anti-drug D.A.R.E. course.

“Let’s put some of the unemployed actors to work,� Ellis said. “If somebody could go in and play Deputy D.A.R.E. (the course’s instructor) who was a good actor, I wouldn’t see a thing wrong with that.�

Ramaul Rush, an juvenile-dependency court investigator in the San Fernando Valley who serves on the city’s social services funding committee, said he also favors youth outreach programs.

“An idle mind is the devil’s workshop,� Rush said. “I believe if you keep kids involved in various programs you can keep crime down.�

Rush said he is an avid reader of the crime log in the newspaper.

“I want to know what goes on around me,� he said. “I don’t feel in view of a statistic that you are truly safe. We have to be ever vigilant on a daily basis and keep our guards up. We need increased police visibility.�

Speeding motorists are an annoyance for Rush, and he believes an increased law enforcement presence will keep offenders to a minimum.

All of the candidates are in favor of getting more deputies onto the streets and increasing community involvement with policing. Sheriff’s Cmdr. Kathy Kemp said her department is already hard at work in instilling that philosophy in its officers.

“We want the officers to get out of their cars and go and talk to people,� Kemp said. “We want them to be more than just a head and body going by in the black-and-white. We’re telling them, if you have time, stop by and talk to people.�

During evening hours, there are usually 11 patrol cars roaming Thousand Oaks. Kemp said her deputies answer about 100 calls for assistance throughout the day. Even if most of the calls turn out to be for minor matters, she said, her department is already busy and strapped for staff.

Most of the candidates are realistic about hiring new deputies, acknowledging that the money simply isn’t there. Markey said money for more deputies would have to come from the city’s general fund, and expressed doubts about taking money from it for policing.

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Winslow suggests that the city work harder to attract more businesses to beef up sales tax revenues, which in turn could be used to hire more deputies.

A regular speaker at City Council meetings, candidate Ekbal (Nick) Quidwai said he spent the last two years pushing for more patrol cars for the department. The acquisition of two new units in 1994 pleased him, but he said the department and the council should now focus on pushing community-based policing.

A graduate of the city’s Citizen’s Academy, which trains residents in basic police procedures, Quidwai said he would encourage other residents to become involved in the program.

Quidwai said Thousand Oaks residents welcome new crime-fighting solutions. But he added that candidates are “preaching to the choir� on this particular issue, and may be taking advantage of an easy chance to score points with voters.

“Generally there are two sides to everything,� Quidwai said. “But crime is one of the few things everybody will agree on. Nobody ever says, we don’t need more police. It’s an issue that politicians everywhere run on.�

This is the first in an occasional series on key issues in the Thousand Oaks City Council race. The candidates give their positions on public safety on B4.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Q&A;

Police Staffing

QUESTION: Do you believe Thousand Oaks needs more police officers, and, if so, how would those positions be financed? As a council member, would you support the city continuing to contract with the county, or should it break off and start its own police force?

John Ellis: The level of authorized sworn officer staffing is adequate for the current population, city layout and response time. The cadet program could be improved by a phase-in of SST’s (sheriff service technicians)--one full-time SST for each two part-time cadets. There is high turnover in the cadet program which results in excessive management cost for training and supervision. The cadet-SST program yields a profit to the city. Better technology would increase efficiency and provide a better work product. Example: VOICE TO TYPED-WORD, it’s available, low in cost and works on their existing computers.

Trudi Loh: I will make public safety a top priority. Our police force must have the resources to keep Thousand Oaks the safest possible community. We must remain tough on crime--but in this era of fiscal constraints, we must also be smart about crime by investing in prevention, particularly with kids. We must work with schools and parks and existing community organizations to give kids an alternative to delinquency and to help kids build character and self-esteem. A separate police force doesn’t make dollar-safety sense because more money would be spent duplicating administration rather than putting police on the street.

Mike Markey: I most definitely believe we need more police officers. However, the fiscal impact of adding the manpower must be considered. If we choose to increase our police manpower, the funding would have to come from the general fund. This would result in cuts in other areas of service which would have to be prioritized. At the present time, I support contracting law enforcement services with the county. For the city to break off and start its own department would be cost prohibitive at this time and a major impact on our general fund. The initial start-up cost for a city police department would make a major fiscal impact on the general fund. However, as a councilman I would look at this option if it would produce a cost savings to the city.

Ekbal (Nick) Quidwai: I have gone through the intensive Sheriff’s Citizen Academy and was almost selected for the VIP volunteer program; was asked to drop because it could be a possible conflict with candidacy? I have been the only candidate to speak about increased funding at council budget meetings. Patrol cars were not increased for about five years as money was diverted to build the giant City Hall and finally last year we got a reprieve! I think our arrangement with the county is working out well and there are economies of scale. Also we are sharing in the lease payments for Olson Road Station until it is paid.

Ramaul Rush: I believe at the present time we have an adequate number of police officers and would support the city continuing to contract with the county. I do believe, however, that there should be greater visibility of our police officers within the community in keeping our city as “one of the safest.� I believe the utilization of the citizens patrol will enable police officers in Thousand Oaks to do more “patrol work� which will hopefully translate into greater visibility in our community.

Lance Winslow: Sure, we could use some more police officers. We could make sure that when a big drug bust goes down in our city limits, we get the proceeds from confiscated properties. We should not break off from the Sheriff’s Department because they do a great job. Average response time is under four minutes for serious crimes. Sgt. (Gary) Pentis has identified gang members. We have lots of undercover officers. If you commit a crime in our town you will get caught. We live in a very safe place, you wouldn’t want to live anywhere else.