LOCAL ELECTIONS / SANTA MONICA CITY COUNCIL : Rent Control Advocates Suffer Another Setback : Rights group still has 4-3 edge, but victory of public safety candidates reflects shift in voter mood. And changes in the Legislature may undermine local law.

Santa Monica, one of the most liberal cities in the nation, took a strong law-and-order stand Tuesday that does not bode well for the liberal rent control forces that have long dominated city politics.

Only one of three candidates backed by the rent control political organization was elected to the City Council. Even worse for the group, Santa Monicans for Renters Rights (SMRR), its rising political star, Councilman Tony Vazquez, was turned out of office after being attacked as anti-public safety by the city’s police union.

“The election was a referendum on SMRR’s public safety and homeless policies,” said Councilman Robert T. Holbrook, the top vote-getter in a field of 11 candidates.

But SMRR co-chair Nancy Greenstein portrayed Vazquez as a casualty of the statewide tide of conservatism and predicted that SMRR would regroup and rebound two years from now.

Though SMRR still holds a 4-3 edge on the council, Vazquez’s defeat is the latest in a series of blows suffered by the political group this year.

They include the loss of voters whose apartment units were knocked out by the earthquake in January and a nearly successful effort in the state Legislature to weaken the group’s strong rent-control law, which will be renewed this year.

In the council election, Holbrook and second-place finisher Ruth Ebner, a Los Angeles deputy city attorney, won with support from a coalition called Citizens for a Safe Santa Monica. Their one-two finish is the first time since 1986 that non-rent control-backed candidates took the top two spots in a council election.

Holbrook and Ebner were also endorsed by the Santa Monica Police Officers Assn. The police union’s entire slate, including SMRR-backed urban planner Pam O’Connor, was swept into office.

The victory for the police slate, which emphasized public safety, culminated several years of political angst over the beach city’s large homeless population and its effect on public safety and quality of life.

Ironically, a bloc of three SMRR-supported council members has voted to enact a series of public safety measures to address the problems, but the public was apparently unsatisfied by the effort.

Unlike previous outings, SMRR started its fall election effort in a weakened condition. The Northridge earthquake damaged or destroyed thousands of rental units, cutting into SMRR’s voter base. About 1,400 units remain out of commission, with an uncertain future. Others have been fixed, but rents have been raised to pay for the repairs.

Another 3,000 rental units have been lost over the past several years under a program that allows apartment buildings to convert to condominiums.

But the greatest threat to the long-range viability of Santa Monica’s strict rent control group comes from Sacramento. There, landlords and real estate interests have been pressing for a measure that would weaken the local law.

This year, a bill to that effect came within one vote of passing the Legislature. That measure, which would have allowed rents in vacated units to rise to market levels, was defeated by one vote in the Senate Judiciary Committee--viewed as the only stumbling block to its passage.

The deciding vote was cast by state Sen. Art Torres (D-Los Angeles), who leaves office at the end of the year. State Sen. David A. Roberti (D-Van Nuys), a champion of rent control who has in past years killed the bill in the Judiciary Committee, is also retiring.

The narrow defeat of the bill, coupled with the changing face of the Legislature due to term limits, indicates that it may be only a matter of time until a measure that would weaken Santa Monica’s law passes.

To forestall that, SMRR needed a strong showing by like-minded Democrats in legislative races across the state and the election of Kathleen Brown as governor. She was viewed as more likely to veto an anti-rent control measure than Gov. Pete Wilson.

Sponsors of the vacancy decontrol measure say they plan to reintroduce it in the Legislature next year.

“It’s our best shot ever,” said Robert Sullivan, spokesman for the Apartment Assn. of Greater Los Angeles.