CAPITAL NOTEBOOK; CONNELL CAN'T CONTROL MEDIA INDIFFERENCE.

Byline: Dorothy Korber and Terri Hardy

Back for a new Legislative session after a three-month break, publicity-parched Sacramento lawmakers - especially the ones up for re-election - put their staffers on overdrive to get their names in the paper.

But the prize for Biggest Publicity Hound goes to state Controller Kathleen Connell, who is considering a run for Los Angeles mayor.

Politicians use the governor's State of the State address as an opportunity to comment publicly on the speech. The usual procedure has legislators holing up in some corner of the Assembly chamber, letting the press come to them. But Connell had her embarrassed staff troll the Assembly floor after the address, strong-arming reluctant reporters and rounding them up for interviews.

Though Connell's office recently came out with an interesting report on Medi-Cal fraud, the fact is that people are only faintly interested in what the state controller has to say. Not that this fazes Connell. On Monday, she held a press conference at the flashy new Golden State Museum to let the world know her vision for California. As far as we know, no one from the press attended.

Connell was apparently so irked that she had staff members call to harangue reporters about their nonattendance. This did little to help her tarnished image. Connell has few friends in the Legislature, and Gov. Gray Davis attempted last session to oust her from the State Allocation Board. One top legislative aide mused that Connell ``had to be one of the most hated people in Sacramento.''

We'd advise Connell not to take it all so personally - after all, she inherited the Biggest Publicity Hound title from Davis himself. When Davis was the lowly lieutenant governor, his staff incessantly roamed the drafty halls of the press building, begging uninterested reporters to quote their boss. Today, less than two years later, the reporters are begging Davis for interviews.

GLITCHES HAPPEN

When Davis delivered his big speech Wednesday, he announced proudly that this was the first State of the State address to be broadcast over the World Wide Web. The written version of the speech also was posted on the Internet.

What Davis didn't know was that Web surfers were seeing the TelePrompTer version of his script, complete with stage directions. So, when Davis got to introduce his wife as ``the love of my life,'' the Internet crowd also saw his prompt: Point to First Lady Sharon Davis. Just in case he had a lapse of memory.

BILL ENVY

Assemblyman Tom McClintock, R-Granada Hills, and state Sen. Betty Karnette, D-Long Beach, have dueling bills seeking to provide refunds to some 1.7 million Californians who paid the $300 smog impact fees on their out-of-state vehicles.

At first, McClintock said he welcomed the double-teaming because it would increase the chances of passage. But the conservative GOP lawmaker has changed his mind.

Now he's issued a press release declaring his bill is better. One page shows a happy elderly man clutching a wad of money under the heading ``Making the Taxpayer Happy, AB 1702 McClintock.'' The next page shows a stick figure at a desk surrounded by mountains of paperwork. The caption: ``Making the Bureaucrats Happy, SB 1325 Karnette.''

McClintock successfully put his bill on a legislative fast track, winning a rule waiver in the Assembly to allow the measure to be heard in a hearing before Feb. 1 - the date McClintock has set for the state to issue refund checks.

His bill would require $767 million in checks to be immediately sent out to those who paid the fee, require that checks be held for those people who can't be immediately located and pay recipients interest at 9 percent. Karnette's bill would notify people of their refund by mail and require claim forms to be filled out. She proposes including interest, but does not state at what rate.