Kaye Rebuffs Rumor

Nine days ago, PolitickerCA.com wondered aloud if former Daily News editor Ron Kaye, who had just left the Valley newspaper, would be running for city council in Greig Smith's district--Smith plans to vacate the seat after his term is over. Kaye would undoubtedly make for an interesting candidate, especially since he often rails against City Hall's standard practice of running council districts as if they were fiefdoms, with no politician messing with the other politician's territory.

Kaye, though, tells the Weekly he has no hard plans to enter the political arena. "I'm open to anything," he says. The former editor also points out that he doesn't live in Greig Smith's district--he lives in Dennis Zine's--and he believes the rumor was some kind of trial balloon sent up by associates of Mitchell Englander, Smith's chief of staff, who does appear to be interested in his boss's job.

In the meantime, Kaye expects to start up a blog--www.ronkaye.com--within the next week. "This is the happiest I've been in a long time," he says. And Kaye has no desire to run against Dennis Zine or to move to a district just so he could run for office.