Lazar Calls for End to Rancor on City Council, Backs Reforms

THOUSAND OAKS —  Calling for a friendlier political climate in the wake of Councilwoman Elois Zeanah’s victory over a recall effort, Mayor Judy Lazar on Wednesday announced her support for campaign contribution limits and creating an elected mayor position during the annual State of the City address.

“With all our accomplishments, this has still been a difficult year,” said Lazar, who along with Councilman Andy Fox, was the subject of a rival recall drive that failed to make the ballot. “The recall efforts--on all sides--have caused a rancorous political environment. We must put the controversy and negative innuendoes behind us.”

Drawing loud applause from the crowd of more than 100 Conejo Valley city, school and business leaders, Lazar also stressed that in her opinion, everybody--all council members included--has been and continues to support “slow growth,” despite accusations to the contrary.

With that in mind, she called for a tighter limit on the number of homes built in Thousand Oaks annually, pointing out that the 33-year-old suburban city is fast approaching build-out.

Measure A, a growth-control law approved by city voters in 1980, already places a ceiling on the number of homes that can be built in Thousand Oaks. But Lazar said Wednesday that the current cap of 650 homes a year is too high and needs to be revised, adding that there should be more thought given to what type of housing is built.

“A significant reduction in the number of units permitted per year may now be appropriate as well as further direction to determine the kind, quality and affordability of housing to be built relative to community needs,” Lazar said, adding that she plans to bring the issue before the council next month.

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Lazar’s remarks about the need for more amicable council relations come on the heels of Fox’s Three-point Plan for City Unity, a series of proposals announced last week to tackle some of the more emotional issues facing the city: growth control, campaign-finance reform and the makeup of the council.

They mark a dramatic shift from statements she made earlier this year upon being appointed mayor by her council peers. Before a roomful of former city leaders, Lazar read a strongly worded statement slamming Zeanah’s record in office and calling her unfit to serve as mayor pro tem. Councilman Mike Markey was later granted the ceremonial title in a tense 3-2 vote.

The second-term councilwoman, who faces reelection next year along with Fox and Zeanah, said she supported Fox’s concept of an “apolitical” blue-ribbon committee that would review other cities’ campaign contribution laws and recommend a new ordinance for Thousand Oaks.

“In my mind, a limit of $20,000 a candidate and self-limits by individual candidates are appropriate for consideration,” Lazar said.

She also said she favors the idea of voters rather than council members selecting the mayor--one of the council-composition issues Fox wanted to examine--and supports placing the matter before voters on the June 1998 primary ballot. Becoming a charter city and having more than five council members were among Fox’s other recommendations.

“We are now a community of approximately 115,000 with an annual budget of $107 million,” Lazar said. “It’s time for the public to decide who should be their mayor--their directly elected mayor. Currently, there are as many interpretations of who should be mayor as there are people.”

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Councilwoman Linda Parks, who like the other council members attended the event at the Thousand Oaks Inn, said afterward that she shares Lazar’s desire to leave council infighting and grandstanding behind. However, she took exception to Lazar’s contention that all the members are “slow growth,” arguing that the council’s record shows otherwise.

“We’re all ‘slow growth’--we just don’t vote that way,” Parks quipped.

Most of Lazar’s speech, which was hosted by the Conejo Valley Chamber of Commerce, was dedicated not to outlining goals but to focusing on recent accomplishments, such as:

* Finally approving an upgrade of the Hill Canyon Wastewater Treatment Plant after a two-year stalemate.

* Seeing sales-tax revenue rise 10% from the year before.

* Fixing up the former city hall complex off Hillcrest Drive so it can be leased out to the National Park Service.

* Moving forward with plans for an environmentally sensitive golf course at Hill Canyon.

* Adding 10 more police positions.

Lazar gave much of the credit for Thousand Oaks’ successes during 1997 to City Manager Grant Brimhall, who was recovering Wednesday from open-heart surgery.

But unless the council can put its personal disputes aside, she said, it cannot govern Thousand Oaks as well as residents need and expect.

“Our citizens,” Lazar said, “deserve a governing body that is effective and competent.”