ELECTIONS : Incumbents Koretz, Land Reelected : Politics: The three-member council majority backed by the powerful Coalition for Economic Survival, a tenants rights group, remains intact.

City Council incumbents Paul Koretz and Abbe Land cruised to easy victories this week as West Hollywood voters marked the end of a quiet campaign with a record-low turnout for a council election.

Opposition hopes for an anti-incumbent rebellion evaporated nearly as soon as the first returns appeared on the chalkboard set up in the West Hollywood Park auditorium, where votes were counted Tuesday. By the end, the incumbents led the closest challenger by ratios of nearly 2 to 1.

Land’s reelection means that the three-member council majority backed by the powerful Coalition for Economic Survival, a tenants’ rights group, remains intact. Koretz, who also won CES backing, does not always vote with that bloc.

Koretz, the current mayor, drew support citywide, leading the field with 2,720 votes, or about 31% of the total. Early in the campaign, he had been regarded as the more vulnerable of the two incumbents, though he reported raising a lot more money than the other candidates by the end of March.

Land, who was the top vote-getter with about 40% in 1988, finished with about 30%. Her drop from four years earlier was probably due in part to the efforts of challenger Rachelle Sommers Smith, a onetime ally who zeroed in on Land throughout the campaign.

Smith, a free-lance publicist, finished third with about 17%. Robert John Pierson, a political novice who teaches urban planning at USC, received almost 15%. George Nicholas Rumanes, who ran a low-profile campaign, got about 4%. John A. Altschul, whose name stayed on the ballot after he dropped out of the campaign in March, received 3%.

The campaign lacked a burning central issue, although challengers attempted to tap voter unhappiness over crime, a new business license tax, the pace of development and incumbency itself.

But, if anything, the campaign seemed to tap a reservoir of apathy. Only about 23% of the city’s 20,000 registered voters cast ballots, the lowest for a regular municipal election since cityhood was attained in 1984. In 1990, about 27% voted, and in 1988 the turnout was 28%.

“There just didn’t seem to be as much energy and interest in this race, by either side,” said Jeff Prang, president of the West Hollywood Democratic Club. Prang, who supported Smith and Pierson, attributed the quietness in part to lower campaign spending by challengers than in past elections. Altschul had cited his inability to raise funds during a recession among his reasons for quitting the race.

“There just wasn’t a lot of excitement generated by the campaigns,” Koretz acknowledged. “They were generally positive and where (Smith) attacked earlier, it was a relatively gentle attack. I think people are generally satisfied with the way things are.”

Land, who first won a special election to the council in 1986, viewed Tuesday’s results as an endorsement of the liberal city’s support of rent control and diverse social services.

“You can stick to the issues, stick to the record,” she said. “You don’t have to run a negative campaign to win.”

Without identifying any campaign organization, Land criticized “the opposition” for a series of flyers delivered to homes over the weekend that she said contained “lies” and inaccurate statistics on issues such as crime. The flyers purportedly were sponsored by community groups that Land and others said did not exist.

Smith, a former member of the city’s rent and business license commissions, said her campaign had nothing to do with the flyers and said she had not seen any.

Despite finishing far behind Land, Smith said she was encouraged by her showing and would consider making another bid in 1994.

“By stopping Ms. Land from having that many votes, I think shows that there’s an anti-incumbent feeling out there,” Smith said.

Pierson, the only openly gay candidate in a city with a large gay community, ran a surprisingly strong shoestring campaign that did well in homeowner neighborhoods on the West End. He said he plans to launch a political coalition focusing on “environmental and social justice” as an alternative to CES, which he had criticized during the campaign as being too closely tied to council incumbents.

WEST HOLLYWOOD 20 of 20 precincts. Votes (%) CITY COUNCIL 2 Elected Paul Koretz * 2,720 (31.2) Abbe Land * 2,626 (30.2) Rachelle Sommers Smith 1,470 (16.9) Robert John Pierson 1,276 (14.7) George Nicholas Rumanes 343 (3.9) John A. Altschul ** 270 (3.1)

-- An asterisk (*) denotes incumbent candidate.

-- A double asterisk (**) indicates an individual who withdrew from the election but is still on the ballot.