Political Parity Is Growing for Ventura County Latinos

Less than two decades ago, the City Council in the farm town of Fillmore adopted a resolution declaring English the official language, angering many in the mostly Latino city. Today, most council members are Latino, and the resolution has been wiped off the books.

A dozen years ago, not a single school board in Ventura County had a Latino majority, despite Latino enrollment in some districts topping 50%. Now a quarter of the county’s 20 school boards are mostly Latino, and a quarter of all school board seats countywide are held by Latinos.

The Oxnard City Council had just one Latino councilman in 1990, even though half the population in the county’s largest city was Latino. In a historic shift of power earlier this month, voters installed a Latino majority on the panel for the first time in the city’s 100-year history.

These are the latest measures of the march toward political parity for Ventura County Latinos, who since 1990 have pushed for greater representation on city councils and school boards.

The recent election brought new Latino council seats in Fillmore, Oxnard, Port Hueneme and Thousand Oaks. Latinos also picked up school board seats in Ojai, Oxnard, Camarillo and Santa Paula.

Taken together, the number of Latino officeholders has more than doubled since 1990 -- from 16 to 38 -- as the county continues its transformation from a white farming region to a racially mixed suburban area.

“I think it shows that the Latino community itself is becoming more involved in the electoral process,” said Ventura resident David Rodriguez, California vice president for the League of United Latin American Citizens. “But I also think it shows that Latino elected officials have broad constituencies and have been able to win support from Hispanic and non-Hispanic voters.”

That growing political clout has taken root across the state and nation.

The Santa Ana City Council gained its first Latino majority in the November election, two decades after the city’s Latino population achieved majority status.

Statewide, Latinos now make up about one-fifth of the 120-member Legislature, picking up half a dozen seats last month. Across the country, voters elected an additional 13 Latino state lawmakers, while adding three Latinos to Congress.

Candidates say they were able to win not only by mobilizing Latino support but by making their case to a broad cross-cultural audience.

“It was just another aspect of my being a candidate,” newly elected Ojai school board member Pauline Mercado said of her Latino roots. “Just like my being a volunteer, my being a mom and my being an educator.”

Although she had been active in the community, Mercado had never before run for political office. But as the mother of a 12-year-old daughter and a professor of education at Cal State L.A., she believed she could contribute to the school system.

Like other newcomers, however, she says that her candidacy was not about advancing a so-called Latino agenda. It was about pursuing interests -- good schools, capable students -- important to the community as a whole.

“I think you have to look for common denominators, and I think the largest common denominator for me is being a parent,” Mercado said.

While more Latinos are finding their way into office, community leaders say more needs to be done.

There is still not a Latino in Congress, the state Senate or the Assembly representing Ventura County. And no Latino has been elected to the county Board of Supervisors since Adolfo Camarillo held a seat near the turn of the last century.

Jaime Casillas, dean of economic development and community initiatives at Oxnard College, said the political landscape for local Latinos is much as it was in south Texas decades ago.

In big cities and small towns, Latinos made up overwhelming majorities but held few elected positions. That changed when they took political power into their own hands by launching voter registration drives and running their own for office.

“The gains we have made in the political arena are a reflection of the desire on the part of Latinos and Latino leaders to establish some self-determination,” Casillas said.

“That doesn’t mean it’s all about separatist politics where Latinos are trying to take over the universe. It just means Latinos are finally starting to lead themselves and their communities.”

Often when Latinos talk about leading their communities, talk turns to the 5th District supervisorial seat held by John Flynn.

Under threat of a lawsuit by a voting-rights coalition, the boundaries of Flynn’s Oxnard-area district were redrawn in the early 1990s to make it the only one of five with a Latino majority. But no Latino has come close to toppling the venerable politician, whose hands-on, door-to-door approach to campaigning and problem-solving has won him solid support.

Still, recent clashes between Flynn and some Latino leaders may foreshadow the bare-knuckle political brawl likely to erupt should Flynn choose to run for an eighth four-year term in 2004.

Flynn has feuded publicly with Oxnard Elementary School District Supt. Richard Duarte and Rio Elementary School District Supt. Yolanda Benitez. Both supported Flynn’s Latino challenger in 2000.

Most recently, Flynn has butted heads with Irma Lopez, the wife of Oxnard Mayor Manuel Lopez and an influential Democratic fund-raiser.

Lopez filed a police report last summer accusing Flynn of verbally threatening her at a Democratic Party barbecue. He later upset Latino leaders by saying Lopez “won’t be happy until she sees a sea of brown faces in every political office in west Ventura County.”

Among those mentioned as potential challengers to Flynn are Benitez, Manuel Lopez and Ventura County Community College District trustee Art Hernandez, who won reelection last month to a seat that represents much of the same area as Flynn’s district. Benitez says she won’t run, while Lopez and Hernandez are noncommittal.

Although Flynn eventually apologized for the “brown faces” comment, he has denied threatening Lopez and holds to his belief that she and a handful of others want to fill his seat with a Latino.

Flynn hasn’t committed to seeking another term. But if he runs again, he expects Latino voters to continue to support him.

“I’m not worried about that group,” Flynn said of his detractors. “My decision to run or not [depends] on whether or not I feel I’ve done my job.”

Perhaps more than anything, the 5th District rift may end the myth that Latinos are a homogenous group. Latino leaders say too many people still believe that Latinos are a single-minded voting bloc, when in reality they are as varied in their backgrounds, political views and voting habits as other Americans.

Take, for example, newly elected Pleasant Valley Elementary School District trustee John Alamillo.

Growing up in predominantly white Camarillo, the 42-year-old general contractor said he focused little on his roots, even though his grandparents were from Mexico and his father was involved in cultural affairs.

“I never really put that much thought into it,” Alamillo said. “I’ve never really seen myself as fully part of the Latino community.”

Likewise, newly elected Thousand Oaks Councilwoman Claudia Bill-de la Pena said she won her seat by running on a slow-growth, environmental platform.

“Cultural background or ethnic background shouldn’t matter,” said Bill-de la Pena, who recently learned she was only the second Latino to hold a council seat in Thousand Oaks.

“I don’t think voters in Thousand Oaks made their decisions based on my last name,” she said. “I think they voted for me based on my qualifications.”

That can be a difficult balancing act.

Some Latino leaders believe their qualifications are more likely to be called into question and that Latino candidates have to be more qualified than their rivals to win office.

But Fillmore Mayor Evaristo Barajas said he believes that is changing, especially as more Latinos prove they can do the job.

Barajas, who was elected to the council in 1996 three decades after moving to Ventura County from his native Mexico, was among those who led the effort to abolish the city’s anti-Spanish language resolution.

In an ironic twist, he said an effort is now underway to provide all materials at City Hall in English and Spanish.

“I think it was inevitable that change would happen,” Barajas said. “In this last election [which gave Latinos a council majority], there was no mention of race. It was all about who was the most qualified candidate. It just so happened that one of the most qualified candidates was Latino.”

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Changes in the halls of power

Latino representation on Ventura County city councils has steadily risen from three in 1990 to 11 today. But there are still no Latino members of the county Board of Supervisors.

*--* City Pop Latino Latinos on Change from 1990 City Council Camarillo 57,077 14% 0 of 5 None Fillmore 13,643 62.3% 3 of 5 +3 Moorpark 31,415 25.7% 0 of 5 -1 Ojai 7,862 14.5% 0 of 5 None Oxnard 170,358 61.8% 3 of 5 +2 Port Hueneme 21,845 36.3% 1 of 5 +1 Santa Paula 28,598 66.1% 2 of 5 +1 Simi Valley 111,351 15% 1 of 5 +1 Thousand Oaks 117,005 11.8% 1 of 5 +1 Ventura 100,916 21.7% 0 of 7 None Countywide 753,197 30.7% 11 of 57 +8 government bodies

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