MAYOR RUNS ALONE IN BID FOR 7TH TERM SIX CAMPAIGN FOR COUNCIL.

Byline: Jim Skeen  Staff Writer

PALMDALE - Mayor Jim Ledford is unopposed in his bid for a seventh term and City Council incumbents Mike Dispenza and Rick Norris will run against four other candidates for the two council seats.

No one filed to run against Ledford in the Nov. 4 election, virtually assuring the mayor of a seventh term. Palmdale election ordinances allow for a write-in campaign, but a challenger would have to mount an extraordinary campaign to unseat Ledford.

Ledford served four years as a Palmdale planning commissioner and two years as a councilman prior to his first election as mayor in 1992.

Running for the two seats in the City Council race are incumbents Dispenza and Norris; Ollie McCaulley, who made a unsuccessful bid for the Assembly seat won by Sharon Runner; Garry Cope, a slow-growth advocate who tried to win a council seat in 2001; former planning commissioner Steve Hofbauer; and Steven Buteyn, who is running a joint campaign with McCaulley.

Dispenza and Norris both seek second terms on the council.

Dispenza, who operates a State Farm Insurance agency, was elected to the council in 1999.

Norris, who owns an export/import company, was elected in a special election on Nov. 7, 2000, to complete three years of an unexpired term.

McCaulley is the director of housing and governmental relations for the Community Partnership Development Corp., a Los Angeles-based nonprofit organization that assists with housing programs for low-income and disadvantaged people.

McCaulley is also a member of the city's newly formed Aviation and Aerospace Commission, a commission set up to advise city officials on how to attract and retain aerospace work.

Buteyn is a Burbank police officer and former vice president of the Palmdale Republican Assembly.

Hofbauer is a senior fire inspector with the city of Los Angeles' Fire Department. Hofbauer served more than 11 years on Palmdale's Planning Commission.