In the coziest, most unusual setting of the election season, the four contenders for City Council went metropolis yesterday, visiting the Beverly Hills/Greater Los Angeles Assn. of Realtors in quest of their endorsement.
While they wait for the results from the latest Candidates Forum, there is plenty to ponder about the performances of the whole field.
Seated at the head of a squared circle of a dozen committee members curious about their attitudes toward development in Culver City, three points of commonality can be made:
• Forty-seven days out from the April 13 election, all, from the most to the least experienced, have overcome their early-season jitters;
• From incumbent Scott Malsin to Jeff Cooper to Meghan Sahli-Wells to Robert Zirgulis, all suffered from radical verbosity. They turned into time-ignoring gasbags. Compulsively and helplessly, they felt compelled to dramatically overstate every answer, forcing the committee to ax the last 40 percent of the program.
• As the four of them comfortably settle into their contending roles, their growing relaxation with public appearances and their increasing familiarity with the salient and subtle issues of the community allowed all four of them to give performances that could be rated “A” or “B.” Specifically, Mr. Malsin won the day, whether or not the board of realtors makes that judgment official. Figuratively loosening his necktie, relating to his listeners at eye level for the first time, he finally marshaled all of the information he has been dealing with daily for the past four years and put it on impressive display.
Surely the intimate, slightly casual setting, on the third floor of a professional building at the Beverly Hills intersection of Wilshire and La Cienega, contributed to the relaxation all of them finally showed.
Not that the three men in the field — like most of their gender, worldwide — yet have any idea what to do with their hands during oratory. Mr. Malsin locked his hands behind his back. Mr. Zirgulis kept his in front. Both, almost distractingly, kept moving them. Mr. Cooper solved their mutual problem. He remained seated, and no one noticed his hands ever jiggle.
Two old Culver City friends were in the room, at least technically creating a minor down-home feeling, the moderator Dannie Cavanaugh and committee member Rich Kissel.
But in the behavioral equivalent of spilling ink all over your hostess’s evening gown, every candidate exposed a persistent sense of insecurity by overselling every answer. No exceptions. Several times when they answered questions with enviable succinctness, they caught themselves just in time. As long as their mouths were open and lockjaw was not an imminent threat, they insisted on repeating their replies for the benefit of deaf mutes hiding in corners or on the other side of the closed door.
Here is one view of how each contender fared:
Scott Malsin: Whether he finally was himself for the first time because this forum was out of town, because the crowd was purposely tiny or natural evolution, he delivered like a committed, informed, engaged incumbent. Gone was the perceived verbal and physical swagger critics have complained about. Gone were the stilted community-loving, Council-accomplishment claims, replaced with rock-solid insights, pertinent data and measured opinions, all crucial for impressing an audience of influential strangers.
Meghan Sahli-Wells: Her most eye-catching strength may be her ability to take the overblown hometown bravado that all of them have practiced and refashion select shards of I Love My Hometown into her own believable central theme. Possibly because as a woman she presents differently from men who have attempted similar strategies, her drumbeating as a residents-first, grassroots-involved, populist flag waver seems to be resonating. However, she needs to improve her familiarity with, and opinions about, certain subjects. Mr. Malsin’s uncommonly muscular showing accented the need for her to broaden and deepen her grasp beyond the residents-first platform, which may be a winner but probably not enough.
Jeff Cooper: Liked his comrades, he, too, has grown this month, especially in confidence and style, both of which voters pay attention to. He never needed to make large changes, just a dozen minor tweaks. He has addressed most or all, and it shows. He is very close to being an airtight candidate for the first time since he began running two years ago. No more of a cinch on April 13 than anyone else, he has thankfully junked his Greatest City in the World script, trading it in for solid, mature, measured, roundly informed perspectives that resist quibbling.
Robert Zirgulis: If trying were the main yardstick, if selflessly expending energy for the betterment of all were pivotal, he would be an Election Day lock. From his shock of thick, middle-parted white hair, to his almost red-in-the-race Everyman style, to his unavoidable penchant for the authentically dramatic man-against-the-world presentation, he can grow on an audience that sees him a few times. He will remind them of classic candidates from the movies, but emphatically he is not a copied form. From his clever (though not crassly commercial) Kill the Red Light Traffic Cameras campaign to his Sundays at Starbucks across from City Hall, he brings a lunch-bucket-carrying image that gives him one of his numerous distinctions from the field.
