When he first began running for city council several years ago, Jon Stevens' single-issue campaign sounded...well, novel.

Put the government on line. Create an electronic democracy.

But that was when the Internet was still just breaking onto the scene. Today, just
about everything is on-line and computerized -- and Stevens' message does not have the same ring that it used to.

Still, Stevens believes there is room for electronic democracy to grow. He says that Santa Monica city officials have a long way to go before they really use the Internet and PEN -- the city's electronic networking system -- to make local
government work better.

"The Internet empowers people," said Stevens, a flight attendant. "I want to change the world and I'm one person who believes that electronic democracy can change the world. Most people rule it out as a pipe dream. But they could have said the same thing about Thomas Jefforson and democracy. I'd like to be the
father of electronic democracy."

One of Stevens' ideas is to put the entire city budget on-line -- line-by-line. Using a search function, he says, residents could pull the numbers apart and analyze them.

"You could break it down and find all the waste," he said. "We could hold public officials accountable."

Okay. But what about the issues?

"We need to stop the incredible tourism -- we've got more than we need," he said. "We need to draw lines on the street where people park. Two cars take up three spaces. We could create special interest groups to talk about things like parking. And we could all meet on the Internet."

His singular focus on electronic government fits with his politics -- the Green Party. However, Stevens never has been endorsed by the party's Westside group. In this weekend's special election, Stevens lost the group's support to Democrat Richard Bloom. In November, the Westside Greens endorsed Stevens' feloow Green Party member Kevin McKeown, who won the election.