THE LOW-DOWN ON THE TOWN Impudent, uncensored account By C. Castle

The other? When it comes to the city council, Mayor Pam O'Connor is just one of the boys. She's not really one of the boys, although she can talk baseball with the best of them. But as the only woman on the council, what's a girl to do?

If Bloom wins the April special election, O'Connor's coterie of men will grow even larger. And SMRR's list of women in office will grow even smaller. Councilman Ken Genser introduced O'Connor during the Bloom fundraiser at Warzawa restaurant -- the Polish place on Lincoln Boulevard -- and joked about the fact that she is outnumbered on the council. O'Connor joked back.

No excuses for SMRR's failure to recruit and run women candidates. No promises that the political organization would like to see that change in the future. And no mention, of course, that Bloom's toughest competition in the race is the only woman candidate: Susan Cloke.

Party Pooper

An unexpected snafu last weekend turned a Civic Forum membership meeting into a non-event. A janitor forgot to open the doors of SMASH, where the meeting was being held, leaving a group of people milling around
outside and waiting to get in. They eventually gave up and left.

Word has it that only a handful of people showed up anyway. Still, a vote is a vote. So where was Councilman Paul Rosenstein in all of this?

Remember, Rosenstein is the one who formed the group last year with a splashy pitch -- calling it the city's alternative to SMRR's political machine, touting it as a group focused on civilized discourse and endorsing three candidates in November's election, which ended
up one of the nastiest in recent memory.

Rosenstein, it turns out, headed north for the weekend, to attend a local government meeting in Yosemite with four of the other councilmembers. Just for the record.... Rosenstein had a room at the Lodge.

Dr. Genser and Mr. Hyde?

Talk about wearing different hats. Councilman Ken Genser, who has been known to give developers and
development attorneys a tough time, is employed by a land use consulting firm -- Santa Monica-based Moss & Associates.

Genser makes the following distinction: He's not working for a developer, but rather for a company that consults with them.

"We do due diligence investigations for people who want to develop property," he said. "It's pretty benign stuff. I don't feel badly about what I do."

Most of the firm's clients are involved in the telecom-munications industry, Genser said, and most of the work consists of obtaining licenses and permits for things like antennaes.

It seems that being on the city council has been good training for Genser in his onsulting role. He recounts a story about a project he worked on in Northern California: neighbors opposed the project and Genser was handpicked by the firm to mediate.

"When it was all done, we had no opposition," he said. "I got it redesigned to make it less bad. I'm not opposed to development. But you need to have development that's compatible with a city."

Years ago, Genser wasn't just a development consultant, he actually developed -- youth hostels, Santa Monica's included. When it first was proposed, residents were in uproar worrying about riffraff. Maybe Genser's development instincts were on track. The youth hostel has ended up as one of the only affordable overnight lodgings left in the city.