CALIFORNIA SENATE : SENATE DISTRICT 16 : Don Rogers--Jim Young

Republicans had hailed the retirement of veteran Democratic state Sen. Walter W. Stiern as their best chance of the year for picking up a seat in the upper house. But the Democratic candidate for the 16th District, Jim Young, was up to the challenge and defeated four-term Republican Assemblyman Don Rogers of Bakersfield. Young is a political neophyte and chancellor of the Kern Community College District, while Rogers is a former John Bircher with a longstanding affinity with the oil industry. As the campaign entered its final days, the two ran neck-and-neck in the district, a sprawling entity stretching from Hanford (in Kings County) in the north, through Bakersfield to Pasadena and all the way to Barstow in San Bernardino County.