Root winning three battle for seat

This story appeared in the Antelope Valley Press November 8, 2000

By BOB WILSON
Valley Press Staff Writer

PALMDALE - A race for a three-year seat on the City Council was a three-way dead heat, based on vote tallies available at 11:35 p.m. In the one-year race, council veteran Jim Root was winning.

With a margin of less than 2% of the vote for the three-year race, contenders Rick Norris, John Mayfield and Sandy Corrales were neck and neck.

Norris held a slim lead in the contest, 5,510 votes, or 31.7% of the ballots cast, while Mayfield had 5,257 votes, or 30.2% of the count, and Corrales 5,192 votes, or 29.9%.

Bus operator Joseph Rivera drew 1,437 votes, or 8.3% of the tally, with about 38% of the city's 45,745 voters counted.

With ballots in 32 of 51 precincts tallied, things were much clearer in the race for a one-year council seat.

Jim Root, vying for his third term on the council, held a considerable lead over four other contenders with 7,241 votes, or 40.9% of the ballots cast.

Defense attorney Richard Loa was trailing Root with 6,024 votes, or 34.1% of the count - a gap of 6.8% of the vote.

Following Root and Loa were union director Alan Lee, with 2,595 votes, or 14.7%; college student Matthew Van Dyk, with 1,452 votes, or 8.2%; and real estate consultant Jason Zink, with 374 votes, or 2.1%.

Norris said he would rather have "a little bigger cushion" but was optimistic about holding onto his lead.

"I'm just waiting with bated breath for the rest of the results," he said.

Mayfield, too, was holding on to hope.

"It's still a horse race. It's still too close to tell. It's strong, but it's still a horse race," he said.

Root was expecting the council race to draw at least 20,000 votes, but given his early position said he was "very impressed and pleased."

"I guess it would be best to say I'm humbled - I guess people remember me," he said, though he would be watching the numbers to see if he lost any ground.

"Obviously, it's going to be a long night," Corrales said.

"We had an awful lot of mudslinging and things going back and forth in the last days of the election, and I'm looking foward to hearing from the people who voted with all the information available in the last days of the election," she said. "I'm hoping people will not reward all of the negative advertising."

This year's special council elections were spurred by the resignations of two members of the council, Kevin Carney and Shelley Sorsabal.

Carney resigned 10 weeks after election in November 1999 to defend himself against felony charges of child molestation. After a mistrial in which 11 jurors voted to acquit him on 12 charges, Carney's legal fate remains undecided.

Carney's resignation preceded by three months that of Shelley Sorsabal, who won her term in November 1997. Sorsabal tendered her resignation after being served with a notice of recall, saying fighting a baseless recall would be ugly politics.

Root, absent from the council for three years, said his return to politics stemmed from a desire to keep Palmdale's future independent of politicians based in neighboring Lancaster.

During the campaign, he promised to support construction of a new hospital anywhere in the city and addition of a new Wal-Mart on the east side of the city.

Mayfield campaigned on a record of 14 years on the city's Planning Commission and a role in city efforts to attract new jobs.

He also promised to support building a new hospital, at any location, as well as the construction of an eastside Wal-Mart.

Loa campaigned alongside Norris, sharing the backing of Palmdale Mayor Pro Tem Mike Dispenza and Lancaster-based politicos such as businessman Frank Visco, attorney R. Rex Parris and Assemblyman George Runner.

Visco and Runner have countered the "home rule" arguments of Ledford's candidates, citing their own Valleywide business or constituent interests.

In their campaign, Loa and Norris promised to bolster law enforcement as well as back construction of a new Wal-Mart and new hospital, as long as that medical facility was on the east side of the city.

Real campaign issues all but vanished in a wave of mud generated primarily by those backing the opposing slates of Root-Mayfield and Loa-Norris.

While Root-Mayfield supporters criticized their foes' use of misleading slate mailers, Loa-Norris supporters publicized Mayfield's fiveyear-old DUI and serious financial woes.

Root was attacked for his attendance record during earlier council service, as well as his role in authoring the city's General Plan, a record he defended vigorously.

Root-Mayfield backers, angered by the DUI revelation, hit back with a radio ad that revealed the Alcoholics Anonymous membership of Loa. They also distributed mailers using an octopus to depict Loa and Norris in the clutches of Lancaster.

Corrales attacked no one, but complained about the dirty tactics of others. Her mian complaint was about pro-Loa-Norris letters distributed by Dispenza. Those letters claimed - inaccurately - that Loa and Norris were the only advocates for an eastside hospital.