CITY HALL ROUNDUP : Big Burrito could bring city together, all right--with heartburn.

WAIT TILL YOU SEE THE DESSERT: When Wilmington officials decide to go for the record books, they leave no tortilla unturned.

The town whose founder brought Los Angeles its first railroad is about to add another chapter to the Southland’s spicy history.

Residents of the community plan to build the world’s largest burrito.

On April 11, about 750 Wilmington faithful will set out to build a 2,000-foot-long burrito to get their town into the Guinness Book of World Records. The ingredients--3,300 tortillas, 800 pounds of refried beans, 150 pounds of cheese--will be donated in an effort to break the current Big Burrito record of 1,597 feet, held proudly by a tiny town in Oklahoma.

“We wanted to do something to bring the community together,” said the event’s creator, Abelardo de la Pena Sr. “We have enough negative publicity about gangs and drugs and everything else. Now we are trying to show the positive side of Wilmington,” said De la Pena, president of the Wilmington Coordinating Council.

If all goes as planned, he said, the Mother of All Burritos will be made atop 250 tables along Avalon Boulevard. And when completed, it will be cut into hundreds of 25 cents-a-piece portions to raise money for a scholarship fund.

Say, while they’re at it, maybe they could fry the burrito before they slice it. Then they could also grab the record for the world’s largest chimichanga.

NAMELY, IT’S CIVIC PRIDE: Meanwhile, over in Carson, they’re having a beef over the name of the city’s mall. Some people think that shopping centers are just not the same unless they have names such as “pavilion” and “place.”

Some Carson residents have taken umbrage that Carson Mall officials are considering changing the center’s name to South Bay Pavilion at Carson.

Marvin Clayton, who heads the city’s mall advisory committee, said he has received a barrage of complaints from residents who object to the word at in the suggested name change. They believe the name “is not sensitive to the community,” said Clayton.

Believe it or not, if they replace the word at with in , that might assuage the wounded pride of local residents.

Mall officials say that their proposed name “is not cast in stone” and that they are open to discussion. Any votes out there for Carson’s South Bay Pavilion Place Shopping Mall Center?

POLITICAL POTSHOTS: The price of a recall petition just went up. Way up.

Showing that small-city politics are taken very seriously by small-city politicians, Lawndale Councilman Bill Johnson this week filed a $17-million libel suit against the leaders of a recall drive campaign to remove him from office.

You might say Johnson was a tad displeased. “It’s absolutely all lies, and it’s libelous,” he said. “This has gone far beyond Lawndale politics. I believe it’s a political ploy from my competitor to try to darken my bid for the mayor’s race.”

Johnson’s suit against Paul Cothran and James Moesinger alleges that the recall drive leaders claimed that the councilman benefited financially from a vote to lend money to the city’s Redevelopment Agency and that he participated in illegal meetings.

Perhaps Cothran and Moesinger should have left well enough alone. When they originally filed the recall petition, the petition itself had to be recalled for lack of information. Indeed, the language in it was so garbled that Johnson called it a joke.

It seems no one’s laughing now.

AND BOY, ARE HIS ARMS TIRED: Commuters who grumble when freeway traffic backs up during rush hour should consider the plight of Manhattan Beach Councilman Dan Stern. Can we talk commutes?

Since 1985, he has been flying back and forth 3,000 miles from his Manhattan Beach home to his job at a large Stamford, Conn., conglomerate. One week here. One week there. Over. And back. The guy earned more frequent flier miles than John Sununu.

But the trek finally got to Stern--and to some top officials at the Olin Corp. who wanted their vice president around the office more.

“It was hard on me physically,” said Stern, “and it was hard on the company because I wasn’t always available.”

This week, the first-term councilman finally chose a coast, saying that the tranquility of Manhattan Beach beat out the hubbub near the Big Apple. He said that after 27 years in the area--with its casual lifestyle, its mild climate and his many friends--he’ll take Manhattan.

LAST WEEK’S HIGHLIGHTS

Palos Verdes Peninsula: Officials announced that PV Transit, a door-to-door transit service, will offer free rides to the polls on April 14, when municipal elections are scheduled in Rancho Palos Verdes and Palos Verdes Estates. PV Transit is operated jointly by Rancho Palos Verdes, Palos Verdes Estates and Rolling Hills Estates.

Inglewood: Two traffic barriers erected five months ago to curtail traffic, crime and litter problems in a Morningside Park neighborhood of Inglewood were ordered removed by the City Council on Tuesday. After fielding more than two hours of public comment, the council voted 4 to 1, with Councilman Daniel Tabor dissenting, to take down the barriers, which block traffic in both directions on West Boulevard at Manchester Boulevard and the southbound lane of Crenshaw Drive at Crenshaw Boulevard.

MEETINGS THIS WEEK

Gardena: 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, 1700 W. 162nd St., Gardena. (310) 217-9565. Televised live on Channel 22 (Paragon) and repeated at 7 p.m. on the next two Sundays.

Hawthorne: 7 p.m. Monday, 4455 W. 126th St., Hawthorne. (310) 970-7902. Televised on Channel 22 (Paragon) at 7 p.m. Tuesday and Thursday and 6 p.m. Saturday.

Hermosa Beach: 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, 1315 Valley Drive, Hermosa Beach. (310) 318-0239. Televised live on Channel 3 (Multivision).

Inglewood: 7 p.m. Tuesday, 1 Manchester Blvd., Inglewood. (310) 412-5280. No cable telecast.

Los Angeles: 10 a.m. Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday at 200 N. Spring St., Los Angeles. In San Pedro, (310) 548-7637; in Wilmington, (310) 548-7586; in Harbor City/Harbor Gateway, (310) 548-7664; in Westchester, (310) 641-4717. Televised live on Channel 35; meetings repeated individually at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday and collectively on Sunday starting at 10 a.m.

Palos Verdes Estates: 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, 340 Palos Verdes Drive West, Palos Verdes Estates. (310) 378-0383. No cable telecast.

Rolling Hills: 7:30 p.m. Monday, 2 Portuguese Bend Road, Rolling Hills. (310) 377-1521. No cable telecast.

Rolling Hills Estates: 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, 4045 Palos Verdes Drive North, Rolling Hills Estates. (310) 377-1577. Televised live on Channel 3 (Dimension).

Torrance: 7 p.m. Tuesday, 3031 Torrance Blvd., Torrance. (310) 618-5880. Televised live on Channel 22 (Paragon), and replayed at 10 p.m. Wednesdays and Thursdays, and at 10 a.m., 3 p.m. and 8 p.m. on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays.