It wasn't too long ago that Bostonians, residents of an often parochial city, considered the corner office in their City Hall to be the most powerful and prestigious one in the land.

When John F. Kennedy '40 set off for the White House in 1961, there were those who remembered that his grandfather, the legendary Mayor "Honey Fitz" Fitzgerald, wouldn't have deigned to move to Washington--not wanting to putter around the South when there was work to be done back in the Hub of the Universe.

Mayor Raymond L. Flynn, now in his 11th year in office, is one of those old-time, baby-kissing pols. More than half of the city says they have met Flynn on one of his many forays to the neighborhood and local bars.

He sees himself as an average guy who worked his way up from Southie to run his city the way it should be run--with an eye toward the people.

Sounds terrific. Boston once needed Flynn--his predecessor, Kevin White, grew directionless and tired after rebuilding downtown Boston, his vague ambitions far higher than the mayoralty of the city.

But Flynn's now suffering from White's disease, growing antsy in the corner office and unsure whether he wants to be Mayor anymore. Both Flynn and White grew disenchanted with the City on a Hill, and wanted more.

There is, though, a big difference. While Mayor White went public and ran (unsucessfully) for governor, Flynn's ambitions are more covert--he just wants to be appointed, not elected.

That means back-room politicking, secret calls to Washington insiders and protecting himself from potential embarassment. Flynn's an old-time pol, and while that often means watching out for the little guy, it means, above all, watching out for yourself.

One day he promises America that he'd end homelessness in no time if made Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. The next day he says he's not seeking anything. And Saturday he says that Clinton probably wouldn't want him in Washington anyway.

Which is it? The Boston Globe reported last weekend that Flynn still secretly has his aides calling Clinton's aides, working to put Flynn's name on as many short lists as possible. HUD Secretary? Health, Education and Welfare?

How about mayor of Boston?

It isn't that he promised his people one thing and gave them another. Bill Clinton did just that, making plenty of Arkansasans furious when he left Little Rock to hit the campaign trail.

But Clinton told the people what he was doing. Ray Flynn won't. And in the meantime, he's letting Boston, and its neighborhoods, go to hell.

Last month, for example, Robert Consalvo resigned his post as Secretary of the Boston School Committee. He was the first to have the post, which Flynn created last year. In fact, Flynn created the entire committee, abolishing the centuries-old elected board and stacking his new one with cronies. Old-time politics? You bet.

Consalvo resigned because things weren't getting done, even in the Flynn-picked School Committee. Granted, Consalvo's proposals were regressive.

He wanted, for example, to use tax money to send students to private schools. That's not what Boston, or any city, needs to fix its schools.

But when Consalvo handed in his resignation, Flynn refused it, to the astonishment of the entire city.

Rather than address the real problems in the schools, Flynn wanted to preserve the symptoms, encouraging a member who couldn't work with his colleagues to stay on and grind the public schools further into gridlock.

He still rounds up the usual scapegoats--Superintendent Lois Harrison-Jones, for example, whose job he'd like to abolish someday. But the responsibility is ultimately on Flynn's head.

If Flynn can't get his own School Committee to do anything right, how does he expect to get anything done in Washington?

In order to get into Clinton's spotlight, Flynn has had to compromise his constituents. If Flynn keeps up his hands-off approach, other, more visible areas of the city may crash and burn, forcing Bostonians to ask whether Flynn really is a modern-day Honey Fitz.

Is Flynn fit to serve in Washington? Hardly.

In Boston? He's only just started his third term, and if he doesn't get a D.C. post, he may just go the way of Kevin White.