Elections 2005

"¡Queremos un cambio! We want change!" mayoral candidate Antonio Villaraigosa hollered before a roomful of campaign volunteers at his South Los Angeles office on a recent Saturday morning. "That's what we want. We want to be judged by our talents," he went on: "Queremos que nos juzguen ... juzgan?" Villaraigosa's Spanish stumbled, caught in the perilous rules of the subjunctive. Was it juzguen or juzgan? People in the room called out their suggestions.

As the primary campaign nears its end, the race for the Republican nomination for state controller has grown testy. The main candidates are former state Assemblyman Tony Strickland of Moorpark, an anti-tax crusader who hopes to rally the party's core conservatives, and state Sen. Abel Maldonado of Santa Maria, a moderate who has been known to reach across party lines.

Antonio Villaraigosa has opened an 18-point lead over incumbent James K. Hahn in the Los Angeles mayoral race, with nearly every large voting bloc supporting his effort to bounce Hahn from City Hall, according to a new Times poll. The survey shows that Hahn has yet to rebuild the historic coalition of South L.A. blacks and San Fernando Valley whites that thrust him into office four years ago. Both groups favor Villaraigosa by wide margins in the May 17 runoff.

Last year's Los Angeles city election set a record for independent expenditures by unions, corporations and individuals, for a total of $4.9 million spent outside the city's system of campaign finance limits, according to a study released Tuesday. Organized labor accounted for 86% of the independent spending, including nearly $640,000 by the California Teacher's Assn. to support then-City Councilman Antonio Villaraigosa for mayor, the city Ethics Commission review found.

With the Los Angeles mayoral election a week away, incumbent James K. Hahn has made large gains among major voting blocs, but still trails challenger Antonio Villaraigosa by 11 points, a Los Angeles Times poll has found. Hahn's improved standing with such pivotal groups as San Fernando Valley whites and South Los Angeles blacks has cut into the 18-point lead that Villaraigosa held in a Times poll last month. But the new survey still reflects pervasive trouble for Hahn.

James E. Holman makes his living in the world of alternative newspapers. For 33 years, his irreverent and wildly successful weekly, the San Diego Reader, has needled the city's captains of commerce, government and society. But Holman has also pursued a passion unusual among his brethren in the left-leaning alternative press: a quiet crusade against abortion.

Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley opened a preliminary investigation Friday into thousands of dollars in contributions to mayoral candidate Antonio Villaraigosa from employees at two Florida firms. "There may be money-laundering issues," Cooley said, citing media reports. "Sometimes information from an investigation opens a criminal filing, sometimes it doesn't. But we still have to do the investigation to gather the facts." Villaraigosa said he welcomed the inquiry.

Mayoral candidate Antonio Villaraigosa released a plan Thursday to protect Los Angeles from terrorists, including an expansion of police intelligence units, and accused Mayor James K. Hahn of failing to do enough to make the city's airports and harbor secure. Hahn, in turn, called Villaraigosa's opposition to an $11-billion modernization of Los Angeles International Airport shortsighted, saying it was essential to improve security.

Three Jewish civic leaders charged Friday that their signatures were forged on cards indicating they support Mayor James K. Hahn for reelection when they do not. The leaders, including Rabbi Steven Weil of Beth Jacob Congregation in Beverly Hills, joined Los Angeles City Councilman Jack Weiss to denounce the campaign's use of those cards to justify listing their names in Hahn-for-mayor advertisements in Jewish newspapers. "It's dishonest and manipulative," Weil said.

One by one, Mayor James K. Hahn and his challengers have appeared before Los Angeles business groups in recent weeks, and each time, they have been confronted with the same vexing question. Why, the candidates are asked, has so little been done to reform the city's byzantine tax system for businesses? Tired of hearing promises of reform in the last two mayoral elections but seeing scant change, the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce, the Valley Industry and Commerce Assn.

Even as they organize a nationwide push for the 2006 elections, conservatives seeking to impose state tax and spending limits suffered twin defeats in high-profile ballot tests this month, casting doubt on their movement's momentum. On Tuesday, California voters resoundingly rejected a ballot initiative to limit state spending; a week earlier, Colorado voters narrowly approved an initiative suspending that state's strict limits on taxes and spending.

For Republicans across the nation, the best news in Tuesday's election may have been that more was not at stake. With President Bush facing his lowest job approval ratings and polls showing widespread dissatisfaction over the country's direction, the GOP suffered a series of bruising blows -- from decisive losses in the New Jersey and Virginia governor's races to the clean-sweep rejection of California Gov.

On a day when they rejected everything else put before them, voters sounded an unmistakable vote of confidence in the ongoing push to build and repair hundreds of Los Angeles Unified School District campuses by easily passing a $4-billion construction bond. Beyond the bricks and mortar, the surprisingly wide margin of victory for Measure Y served as vindication for schools' chief Roy Romer, who shepherded the bond to victory despite a host of doubters and strategic disadvantages.

Ventura voters returned three well-known faces to City Hall in Tuesday's balloting, and added a fourth member who shares the council's vision for rebuilding the seaside community's historic downtown. Incumbents Jim Monahan, Brian Brennan and Neal Andrews easily won reelection to the seven-member panel. Ed Summers won the seat left open when Councilman Sandy Smith decided not to seek a new term. Summers said the results indicated that city voters are generally satisfied with the city's direction.

The fear that some girls could be at risk if their parents were told they planned to have an abortion combined with a "just say no" mood among voters to sink the parental notification measure on Tuesday's ballot, strategists who worked on the campaign said Wednesday. Partisans on either side of the abortion debate cited two other reasons, as well, for the defeat of the initiative, Proposition 73.

In a rare move for a coastal city, voters in Hermosa Beach soundly defeated a ballot initiative that would have restricted new construction along the town's beachfront. Measure E, opposed by 56% of voters in Tuesday's election, would have required voter approval for any new "improvements" on the beach. "It failed because it was poorly written and too all-encompassing," said City Councilman Michael Keegan, who opposed the initiative.

James K. Hahn and his two main rivals battled Friday into the last weekend of a neck-neck-and-neck contest for Los Angeles mayor, trading charges over personal integrity and the state's 2001 energy crisis. Hahn was joined by a prominent consumer advocate in pressing his attack on Bob Hertzberg, who was Assembly speaker for two years, which included a summer of blackouts and soaring electricity rates.

Candidates for the Westside seat on the Los Angeles City Council spent their final day on the stump Monday trading barbs over the massive Playa Vista housing project, which has become symbolic in a campaign largely about development and traffic.

On a day of fierce recriminations, Republican allies and friends of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger appeared shaken Wednesday by the collapse of his agenda in this week's special election, saying he needs to recapture the confidence of voters by jettisoning some of his political advisors.

Jose Huizar and Herb Wesson captured the empty seats on the City Council, but the evening's big winner was Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who picked up two friendly votes he will probably need to push his ambitious and costly agenda through the council. "It was," said Villaraigosa, "a good night." "Obviously, I endorsed both early on, and I did because I truly believe they bring experience and leadership that we need right now on the council," said the mayor.