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It may not be an exact analogy. But trying to picture new City Council members Mehaul O’Leary and Christopher Armenta on the dais shortly after 7 o’clock this evening is kind of like trying to imagine your girlfriend as your wife.
She really will be on the porch, dressed to kill, at 5:30 every afternoon before you breeze through the door, flinging her adored and loving arms around you as she squeezes the last five drops of stress out of your consciousness.
I don’t think Mr. Armenta’s wife Colleen or Mr. O’Leary’s wife Susan will be throwing their arms around anybody but their hubbies tonight.
As for No. 3
I did not overlook the third new Councilman, Andy Weissman. He has been on the dais on advisory commissions so often over the years, he could give lessons in relaxation to the Council holdovers, Scott Malsin and Gary Silbiger.
Mr. O’Leary never has sat there.
In Mr. Armenta’s limited experience, as the City Clerk, he has appeared on the dais in a subservient role, in the role of a messenger, which the City Clerk — now Asst. City Manager Martin Cole — is obligated to play.
As far as I can tell, the job of Councilman is as new to Mr. O’Leary and Mr. Armenta as marriage is to be a boy who has grown up in a religious school. He does not know what he is supposed to do, just who he is supposed to do it with.
Getting a Line on Freshmen
Over the next several weeks, we will figure out who are allies, who would prefer to be on a separate planet and how long it will take for them to make us forget the smoothness of Carol Gross, Steve Rose and Alan Corlin, the three members who are term-limited as of about 7:15.
We can talk another time about their lack of chemistry or feelings for each other in their personal lives. A person close to one of them told me last week she doubted her friend would speak to the other two departees until they re-meet at a funeral.
But on the dais they were mavens. They knew how to knead, when to weave, how much to compromise. Surely they were not fully grown when they walked into Council Chambers 8 years ago.
Way up There
Compared to this evening’s newcomers, Mr. Rose, Ms. Gross and Mr. Corlin look as if they inhabit the Land of the Giants. I hate to see any of them leave, and their mass exit affirms that term limits was one of the most petty, ill-conceived amateur political stunts of the last 25 years. It was as poorly thought out as restricting the Council seats to men with a certain shading of brown hair.
The always authoritative, silky professionalism of Mr. Corlin will be missed, possibly even mourned.
When Ms. Gross steps down in a few hours, she will be taking with her perhaps the most imposing bank of governmental data and knowledge ever accumulated by any two or three Council members in Culver City history.
Mr. Rose was the badly needed balance wheel whose business-oriented agenda kept the Council steered toward the common sense lane. He was equally often predictable and flexible.
If Mr. Weissman slips into the Alan Corlin kind of role, will one of the other two freshmen emulate Ms. Gross or Mr. Rose?
