ELECTIONS : Council Seats Up for Grabs in 4 Cities : Politics: Issues range from development to rent control in Beverly Hills, Culver City, West Hollywood and Malibu. Another factor is an anti-incumbent mood.

Voters in four Westside cities go to the polls on Tuesday. The city council candidates in those cities are campaigning on issues that vary from development to rent control. In some of the races part of the national anti-incumbent feeling seems to have trickled down to local level.

BEVERLY HILLS

As the Beverly Hills campaign went into its final weeks, apartment owners from Beverly Hills and Los Angeles came up with just under $7,000 for pamphlets opposing the candidacy of Herm Shultz, who stepped down as president of a renters group to run for City Council.

In their mailing, the apartment owners said Shultz’s election would open the door to strict rent control, along the lines of that found in Santa Monica and West Hollywood, something Beverly Hills voters rejected in 1982.

Shultz said he would respond with a mailing of his own, “specifically referring to the importation of outside money into our city and disrupting the election process by focusing on one candidate.”

The big surprise of the race was the endorsement by a local weekly of Anna R. McLinn, who ran unsuccessfully for a seat on the school board in November but did not file to run for City Council.

McLinn, an elementary school principal in the Los Angeles Unified School District, said she was as surprised as anybody by the support of the Beverly Hills Courier, which ignored the reelection bid of City Councilman Bernard J. Hecht but supported incumbents Allan L. Alexander and Vicki Reynolds.

McLinn, the paper said, is the sort of person the city should be on the lookout for, someone with “leadership qualities, but . . . not burdened with political alliances of ‘machine’ obligations.”

Although any votes for her will not be counted, McLinn, who is black, said she welcomed the support, especially since the city’s demographic makeup has become more diverse in recent years.

“It is not democratic to have the City Council and the Board of Education in the hands of a few,” she said.

The city’s other weekly, the Beverly Hills Post, was expected to endorse all three incumbents along with challenger Tom Levyn, staffers said.

The Beverly Hills Police Officers’ Assn. also endorsed Levyn and the three incumbents.

“Of all the people who came to talk to us, they’ve shown the strongest support for a wide range of city issues that would benefit both the city and the Police Officers’ Assn.,” said Detective Joe Chirillo, a member of the board of the organization.

The police endorsement brings with it the volunteer work of officers who campaign door-to-door on off-duty hours, Chirillo said.

The Beverly Hills Firemen’s Assn. also endorsed the incumbents, but its support comes with donations of $1,000 to each of them.

“With the three incumbents, naturally we have a track record we can look at, and considering the times we’re in, the three have done a pretty good job,” said Stan Speth, president of the fire association.

Meshulam Riklis, whose drastic remodeling of the historic Pickfair estate was also approved by the City Council, gave Hecht $2,000, according to campaign contribution reports.

Challenger Salvatore W. (Bill) Di Salvo, who expects his campaign to cost less than $1,000, has come up with an idea he believes would save the city millions.

It involves the establishment of a “Beverly Hills discount long-distance telephone company,” complete with calling cards for use away from home or office.

Challenger James Fabe is also money-minded. If elected, he would crack down on local businesses by comparing the license rolls with the Yellow Pages to find tax evaders, he said.

CULVER CITY

Five candidates are competing for three seats on the Culver City Council on Tuesday.

They are incumbents James D. Boulgarides and Steven Gourley, and challengers Mollie (Lee) Welinsky, Richard Alexander and Albert Vera. Mayor Paul A. Jacobs is not running for reelection to the council.

Two issues have flared up in these last few days before the election: a controversy over the building height limit law passed by voters in 1990, and a rumor that the City Council ordered staff to study the idea of contracting out for fire and police services. Both issues have caused widespread misunderstandings.

The city attorney has said the height limit should not be applied to the city’s redevelopment areas because they were not properly addressed in the initiative.

Height-limit supporters have maintained that the original intent was to include the areas. Boulgarides, Gourley and Welinsky have pledged to apply the limit to redevelopment areas.

But comments made by slow-growth activist Robin Turner at a recent council meeting temporarily cast doubts on the original intent. Turner said the law purposely left room for emergency projects over 56 feet high to squeeze by.

Turner’s opponents quickly responded that the expansion of Sony Pictures Studios is such a project, because it could bring millions in revenues to the cash-strapped city.

But Turner has since clarified her statement, saying the loophole she referred to was meant only for rebuilding structures over 56 feet high that had been lost to some natural disaster, such as an earthquake or fire.

The rumor about the council ordering a look at contracting for police and fire services grew from suggestions made by a resident at recent council meetings. The rumor fostered anti-incumbent feelings among the city’s police and fire personnel.

But the City Council never acted on the suggestion, according to Chief Administrative Officer Jody Hall-Esser.

However, Hall-Esser added, in order to prepare for budget deliberations this summer, she asked all departments to look into the cost savings associated with contracting out for some, and even all, of their services.

MALIBU

Up the coast, where 20 candidates are vying for three City Council seats--and the four-year terms that go with them--campaigning has been fierce between two political action committees and the candidates they support.

Observers say the election is likely to help shape the future of Malibu for years to come, because whoever sits on the City Council in the next couple of years will have the chance to leave a mark on a General Plan that will serve as a blueprint for future development in the young city.

The Malibu Grassroots Movement, or MGM, which aims to defeat incumbents Mike Caggiano and Missy Zeitsoff, has endorsed Councilwoman Carolyn Van Horn, a retired teacher, and contenders Jeff Kramer, an attorney, and Joan House, the administrator of her husband’s medical practice.

The trio, all of whom are allied with Councilman Walt Keller, have criticized the council majority for being lenient with development interests and insist that new leadership is needed to put Malibu’s financial house in order.

Citizens United for a Stable Malibu, whose organizer, Joy Ellis, has ties to Mayor Larry Wan, has backed three challengers: attorney Jeff Jennings, real estate broker Paul Grisanti and pharmacist Frank Basso.

But, while MGM has raised more than $21,000--and has benefited from about $10,000 worth of ad space and personal services from an advertising executive who is a member of the group--Citizens United has garnered less than $5,000 and has been beset by organizational problems.

After Citizens United’s endorsements were announced, two of the six members of its steering committee quit, and even its co-chairwoman, Susan Reynolds, acknowledged that she wasn’t consulted in advance.

Meanwhile, Caggiano has emerged as the top money-raiser in the campaign after a slow start. Despite ties to the mayor, Caggiano, a public policy analyst, and Zeitsoff, a retired teacher, have attempted to stress their independence.

WEST HOLLYWOOD

At candidate forum after candidate forum, the same handful of City Hall critics rise from the audience to fire away at City Council members Abbe Land and Paul Koretz.

Each time, the incumbents repeat well-practiced answers to questions about their political ambitions, crime, city spending and the new business tax while defending the city’s current direction.

The key to which of five candidates will win the election Tuesday is whether those residents are a symbol of wider voter discontent or merely an annoyance.

So far, the campaign for the two available seats has been one of the quietest--and most polite--in the city’s seven-year history.

The two most visible challengers, Rachelle Sommers Smith and Robert J. Pierson, are hoping that an anti-incumbent mood reported at the national and state level trickles down to the city, because no other single issue dominates the race. The fifth candidate, George N. Rumanes, has emphasized crime in his low-key campaign.

Except for challenger John A. Altschul’s surprise decision to drop out last month, the contest has gone largely as expected. Land and Koretz again won the backing of the Coalition for Economic Survival, a politically active renters rights group with a history of endorsing the eventual winners.

Koretz, with close ties to some of the area’s best-known Democratic Party figures, has led the field in campaign contributions, as he did in 1988. He reported receiving $41,700 by the end of March, while Land, a six-year incumbent, reported $24,910, according to records on file in the city clerk’s office. Smith, a former member of city rent and business license commissions, reported $12,372 in contributions. Pierson, making his first foray into politics, reported receiving $2,232. Rumanes did not file a financial report.

Many observers are predicting a below-average turnout, and candidates have worked especially hard to capture a projected 2,000 absentee votes. All told, about 5,500 residents voted in the 1990 campaign, with three seats at stake.

Times staff writers Mathis Chazanov, Ken Ellingwood, Bernice Hirabayashi and Ron Russell contributed to this story.