Evan Thies, the 29-year-old candidate for City Council in the 33rd district, was sitting at a small cafe table reading the Daily News and the Post, when I walked into Ozzie's on Fifth Avenue. He got up and gave me a kiss

"Kissing reporters, eh?" I said. "And babies, too?"

"No babies. People don't much like politicians lunging for their babies anymore," he said with his characteristic drollness.

I had coffee with Thies last year at the Seventh Avenue Ozzie's. It wasn't an interview just a meet and greet. This time I had my notebook ready and once I had my first cup of coffee of the day we launched into a lively discussion of Thies' childhood.

Doctors and politicians figure prominently in Thies' life. His father, a doctor, was born in Queens. His mother, who has a doctorate in psychology, was born in New Hampshire.Theis, who was born in Roosevelt Hospital in Manhattan, grew up in New Hampshire near his mother's childhood home.

At the age of 6, Thies was struck with Fibromatosis, a chronic disease characterized by benign soft tissue tumors that can be very painful and disfiguring. Thies was homebound during the worst of the disease, which was treated with chemotherapy. When he was 11-years-old, he and his mother wrote and passed a bill about independent educational programs for children with chronic diseases. He remembers walking around the  state capital in Concord talking to politicians about this issue.

But politics was nothing new for young Thies. His grandmother, Mary Mongon, was appointed by President Ronal Reagan as New Hampshire's Commissioner of Health and Human Services.

During her time as commissioner, AIDs was spreading like wildfire. Thies' grandmother, a former nurse, decided that the sensible thing to do was to distribute information pamphlets and condoms.

According to Thies, New Hampshire's Governor John Sununu "freaked out" about the condoms and asked her to stop immediately. "You'll have to fire me," she told the governor. This was front page news in New Hampshire newspapers.

Despite the fact that Sununu called for Mongon's dismisaal, she got the funding she needed to distribute the condoms and actually cut transmissions of new AIDs cases in New Hampshire, Thies tells me proudly. "She's the reason I fell love with government and believe that it can be idealistic and effective."

By the time Thies was in high school, his  Fibromatosis was in remission (if that's the word). He founded his high school newspaper and studied journalism and political science at Syracuse University. A reporter for The Daily Orange, Syracuse University's daily student newspaper, Thies covered the  Schumer/D'Amato senate race in the general election and says it was "a great experience."

During college, Thies took time off to intern at Scripps Howard New Service in Washington to cover the 2000 presidential primaries. But by senior year in college Thies knew he wanted to be "on the other side of the notebook."

"I'm too impatient for journalism," he told me. I asked him what he meant.

"If you understand government and think you'd be good at it, drop what you're doing and run for office," he told me.

So, what does it mean to be good?  "Integrity and the ability to stick to your beliefs," he said quickly.

After college, Thies worked Hillary Clinton's Western New York State senate office and then moved down to New York City without a job but with the strong desire to work in city government. He considered law  school but after an accidental meeting with Councilmember Yassky on the streets of Boerum Hill, Thies was offered a job.

It was 2002 and Thies describes Yassky's office as a laboratory for ideas. "He helped me to understand how powerful a good idea can be. He taught me that you have to work very hard, know every fact, take any meeting you can to get an allie and get to know your dissenters."

After four years in Yassky's office, Thies decided he wanted to be the man to replace his boss. With the support of his wife Beth, an advertising executive he met at Syracuse University, Thies threw his hat into the ring. He is quick to point out that while he has deep respect for David Yassky, he disagrees with him on a number of issues including the Atlantic Yards (Yassky was a major equivacator) and the repeal of term limits (which Yassky supported).

As someone who knows the way the City Council works, it's not surprising that reform of the City Council  is his top issue. As part of this, Thies believes that the NYC budget and the way that it is decided (i.e. the mayor and the speaker have all the power; City Council members have very little) has to change.

"The City Council could provide a system of checks and balances much like the federal system. This means more transparency, line by line vetoes and the power to submit amended budgets. I want to see equal power with the mayor regarding the budget and how it's done," Thies told  me.

According to Thies, it is the way the City Council functions (or doesn't) that affects everything, including development and land use issues. A key part of the problem is the huge amount of power given to the speaker. Thies tells me that there is a culture of fear of reprisal at the City Council if you cross the speaker.

"Christine Quinn has NOT wielded this power as harshly as others," Thies says. But the fear of losing your committee seat, your budget, etc. is real.

Not surprisingly, Thies has a long punch list of reforms for the City Council. But what about ideas that will be meaningful to the voters of his district? Like development…

"We have to put an end to ready, fire, aim development which has put us in serious trouble," Thies tells me. To remedy this Thies has developed something called 360 Degree Planning that would require developers to take into account how a plan would affect schools, transportation, the environment,
housing costs, open space, and general infrastructure."

The economy: Thies wants to see a resurgence of small industry in Brooklyn. 'Its been beaten all the way back," Thies says. Mom and pop shops and freelancers ("which are also small businesses," he tells me) are also a concern.

And education: Like the other candidates, Thies recognizes the shortage of classroom space and believes there needs to more parent/teacher involvement in the system.

About mayoral control of the Department of Education: "Mend it don't end it" is Thies' mantra. He believes that there should be an  Independent Education Office to provide checks and balances to what the Mayor is doing and a reduction to the size of the Mayor's Department of Testing and Accountablility, which has an oversized budget.

An hour passes quickly and we've been chatting for an hour-and-a-half before we leave Ozzie's and walk to Thies' car (yes, he has a car). There are a lot of  doorbells to ring over the next month, more candidate forums to attend and a lot of hands to shake in his effort to win the votes of the 33rd District.

But that's the world he's comfortable in. Thies, who has a deceptively low key manner, isn't always the most forceful when expressing his ideas, but he is someone who understands politics. As a kid he advocated for the rights of chronically ill children and watched his grandmother talk back to the governor. As a college student he followed a statewide senate race for his college newspaper and reported on the presidential primaries in 2000. Later he worked for Senator Hillary Clinton.

In New York City since 2002, he learned even more working as an aide for David Yassky. As he says, if you understand government and believe you'd be good at it…

Even if he is only 29-years-old and has no intention of kissing babies. Not in this race anyway.