Thousand Oaks : Reelection Makes Recall Drive Moot

An effort to recall a Thousand Oaks city councilman has been abandoned, leaders of the drive said Wednesday.

Richard Booker, co-chairman of the Committee to Recall Alex Fiore, said the effort was called off because City Council members Frank Schillo and Lee Laxdal were reelected Nov. 8.

“With both incumbents reelected it would be a futile exercise to remove Mr. Fiore from office,” Booker said. “The prevalent philosophy of unresponsiveness on the council would not be altered.”

“The election results proved that the great majority of Thousand Oaks is happy with what the council is doing,” Fiore said.

Booker said the recall effort was organized in June by residents angry about a council decision to ignore petitions calling for a vote on the Jungleland redevelopment project.

Council members Fiore, Laxdal, Schillo and Tony Lamb voted in March to ignore the petitions calling for a referendum on the $70-million project. The same four councilmen voted in favor of the redevelopment project in August.

The ambitious Jungleland project would be a joint venture between the city’s redevelopment agency and a private developer to build a civic auditorium and office-hotel complex on 20 acres the city bought last year.

The council’s vote came after it was presented with two petitions, one calling for a referendum and the other supporting the project. Council members have said residents will have ample opportunity to comment on the proposed development during a series of public hearings.

But project opponents say the development would waste taxpayers’ money.

Schillo and Laxdal were not targeted for recall because they were up for reelection, and the committee hoped they would be defeated, Booker said. Lamb did not anger the committee because “he joined the others just to get support for his own projects,” Booker said. Councilman Lawrence E. Horner was not served with a recall notice because he voted to support a referendum, Booker said.

Recall supporters had until mid-December to collect the 7,852 signatures of registered voters required to force a recall. Booker said he did not know how many signatures had been collected.