This small town in San Diego County won a skirmish with Blackwater Worldwide on Wednesday, as residents voted to recall five members of a planning board that endorsed the global security contractor's plan to build a firing range in a nearby valley.
The results were announced early Wednesday, several hours after polls closed Tuesday night.
"All five were recalled," said registrar Deborah Seiler, adding that final vote certification would come later Wednesday.
The members - chairman Gordon Hammers, Jerry Johnson, Mary Johnson, Janet Wright and Thell Fowler - lost by wide margins, according to the voting tallies.
Fowler's spread was the smallest, losing her recall fight 176 to 104 while Hammers received the biggest voter boot, 196 to 84.
Hammers said the board's decision had been misconstrued, and that its goal was to investigate what jobs and other perks having Blackwater might mean for the community.
"We chose to stay engaged," said Hammers. "Certain elements made it an anti-Bush, anti-Iraq war surrogate and sold that to the community. They were successful."
The Potrero planning board, which has an advisory role, voted last December to send Blackwater's preliminary proposal to the county, sparking immediate opposition that only grew as national attention to the company's activities in Iraq intensified.
Final say over the project rests with the county board of supervisors, who won't consider the plan until environmental impact reports have been completed.
A sixth board member who was not part of the board when it voted last year was not up for recall, said Hammers.
The five recalled members will be replaced by candidates who were also on Tuesday's ballot.
A call to a Blackwater spokesman early Wednesday seeking comment was not immediately returned.
This Blackwater scuffle had been a controversy of a different kind for the company, which has been the target of congressional hearings and now a criminal investigation into the shootings of 17 civilians in Baghdad by contract guards in September.
The community of about 850 residents is tucked high in the desert mountains near the Mexican border. Controversy here means putting up hand-painted wooden signs decorated with American flags that read "Stop Blackwater."
Many who welcome the prospect of jobs and services that would follow Blackwater object to the company's controversial record in Iraq, while others worry the facility would spoil the area's relative isolation.
It's a 45-mile drive along a winding two-lane highway from downtown San Diego to the 800-acre chicken ranch Blackwater intends to transform into a state-of-the-art training camp for law enforcement. The facility would include 11 firing ranges, a driving track and a helipad.
For Blackwater, the valley would be an ideal complement to its headquarters in Moyock, N.C., and a satellite training center in Mount Carroll, Ill., about 150 miles west of Chicago.
The California site is remote and shielded by mountains, but it is also a short drive from downtown San Diego and its array of military bases and federal law-enforcement field offices - including U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol. In the wake of the Baghdad shootings, the company is focusing on its training operations and trying to wean itself from overseas contracts.
