Barbara Diamond City Council candidates didn’t get...

Barbara Diamond

City Council candidates didn’t get much sleep Tuesday night.

It was 4 a.m. before Toni Iseman, Steve Dicterow and Elizabeth

Pearson knew they had been elected to the City Council and Melissa

O’Neal knew she had lost.

“I was much more nervous this time than the first time I ran,”

said Iseman, the top vote-getter in the tally announced Wednesday.

“The last time someone called and woke me at 5:30 a.m. to tell me I

had won.”

This was one of the closest elections in Laguna’s history. Only

329 votes separated Iseman’s 4,678 votes from O’Neal’s 4,349 votes.

Pearson came in second with 4,572 votes. Dicterow was third with

4,542 votes.

“I think we will have no problem working together,” Iseman said.

If tradition holds, Iseman will be elected mayor when the new

council is sworn in Dec. 3. She served as mayor pro tem this year.

The election was close from the get-go. The first results, all

absentee ballots, were announced at about 8:30 p.m. Dicterow led with

1,109 votes, followed by Iseman with 1,052 votes, Pearson with 1,050

and O’Neal with 990 votes.

The city has about 16,700 registered voters. The turnout was not

exceptional.

“There was nothing in the campaign to get the voters attention and

nothing to get the average person to vote,” said Norm Grossman, who

directed Dicterow’s successful bid for a third consecutive term. “The

campaign had the usual look, the usual feel.”

It wasn’t usual for O’Neal, making her first run for public

office.

“I learned a lot in terms of running a campaign and I am thrilled

at the people I met at concerts, events and just walking the

streets,” she said. “It has confirmed for me that our town is a gem.

And that is what fuels my passion.

“Right now I am physically and mentally exhausted from Tuesday,

but I am ready to run again. I want to be the top vote-getter two

years from now.”

Pearson, a business owner, said her experience outside the city

will help her as a council member.

“A lot of my work can be useful for the city,” Pearson said. “I

have created foundations in Rancho Santa Margarita and Orange to spin

off the costs of capital projects onto private organizations.”

Tuesday was a good day for Pearson. Not only did she win a seat on

the council, she helped the city of Orange latch onto $1 million in

state funds to the county for the Community Foundation of Orange.

“In my business, I have learned ways to access funds for projects

so they are not a burden on the taxpayer,” she said. “My job has

provided an introduction to funds that we can use in Laguna.”

Incumbent Dicterow raised the least money of any of the

candidates, relying heavily on his record for the past eight years.

He is now the senior member of the council.

“The election’s over,” Dicterow said Wednesday. “It was a great

campaign. I am honored to be re-elected and now, I just want to focus

on the agenda for the next four years.”

Iseman and O’Neal headquartered at Mark’s restaurant. Iseman, a

Democrat, and O’Neal, a Republican, supported one another in the

election. Both were endorsed by Village Laguna.

Former Mayor Kathleen Blackburn and Councilwoman Cheryl Kinsman

arrived at about 9 a.m., after attending the party hosted by Dicterow

and Pearson at Hennessey’s.

Dicterow does not endorse any other candidate when he is running

for office, but he and Pearson were endorsed by the Laguna Beach

Taxpayers Assn. Both are long-time North Laguna residents, active in

the North Laguna Neighborhood Association.

The Dicterow/Pearson shindig broke up early, when the candidates

realized the Laguna Beach count would be late. Ballots are trucked to

Santa Ana to be counted. All precincts must be in before the truck

leaves.

The count was completed at 4 a.m. Wednesday morning, with about

60,000 to 65,000 countywide absentee ballots still to be tallied. The

absentee ballot count will be updated Nov. 12. The election is

scheduled to be certified Nov. 26.