August 2, 2002

Not yet a candidate, Fitzmaurice mulls re-election bid
By DAN WHITE
Sentinel staff writer

Councilman Tim Fitzmaurice plans to take out papers for the City Council election in November, and is strongly weighing a run. But he said it’s too early to call him an official candidate.

Fitzmaurice invited supporters to gather today at City Hall at 3 p.m. to sign his registration papers.

Fitzmaurice, 53, a lecturer in UC Santa Cruz’s writing program, was elected in 1998 as part of a slate including Mayor Christopher Krohn and Councilman Keith Sugar. All their seats will be up for election in November.

He said he has plenty of goals for another term, "including improving low-cost and senior housing, youth services, parking in the neighborhoods, especially in downtown, and improving the fire department, which I think is understaffed."

Cynthia Mathews and Mike Rotkin, both former council members and mayors, already have taken out papers for the November election. Others who have taken out papers include Thomas Leavitt, Dave Eselius, Karen Woblesky, James Cotter, Jeremy McMillan, Sal Maleti, Jason Pineda and Rick Sihler.

While Mathews and Rotkin also have filed their statements of intention to run and have organized campaign finance committees, they have yet to file nomination papers, which would make their runs official. No one else has filed any papers.

Mathews founded the Planned Parenthood office in Santa Cruz and now serves as its spokeswoman. Mike Rotkin is a UC Santa Cruz lecturer.

It appears the filing deadline will be extended from Aug. 9 to Aug. 14 because one of the incumbents, Sugar, has announced he has no intention of running. The Aug. 14 deadline applies to all candidates except for Krohn and Fitzmaurice. They are required to file papers by Aug. 9.

Krohn has said he’s leaning toward running, but has yet to make an official announcement.

Over the past few months, downtown residents and merchants have bombarded the council with complaints that downtown feels unsafe. The complaints culminated last week when the council majority made some downtown ordinance revisions, which take effect in September. They set new space standards for panhandlers, ban sign-holding panhandlers after dark, and ban the kicking of footbags, and other sports, on the often-crowded Pacific Avenue.

Fitzmaurice supported the changes. Krohn voted against all of them. Sugar opposed most of the revisions, but voted in favor of the ban on playing sports downtown.

Many lauded the city action, but others felt it did not go far enough. In general the decision angered activists who said the changes unfairly target the poor.

In 1998, Fitzmaurice ran as a Green Party candidate, and was endorsed by the Santa Cruz Action Network. Last month, representatives of SCAN and the Green Party tried to get the council to delay a vote on the downtown changes, to no avail.

Fitzmaurice said he could not predict how this would impact his run, but said Santa Cruzans respect differences of opinion.

"I think people respect me sufficiently to understand I am doing the best I can with a complicated process. It’s just that we needed to act. We’ll see how that works out. ... I may be one of the only people running who has a recent record and people will judge me on that, and that’s fine. I can accept the will of the electorate on that."

Contact Dan White at dwhite@santa-cruz.com.