BY TYLER BRIDGES AND DON FINEFROCK

 On a tense day when the Cuban exile community feared that federal authorities
 would try to snatch Elian Gonzalez from his Little Havana home, Miami Mayor
 Joe Carollo and Miami-Dade County Mayor Alex Penelas made repeated appeals
 for calm in meetings with exiles, in interviews and directly to the protesters
 outside the boy's house.

 Both mayors support the efforts of Elian's Miami relatives to keep the boy in the
 United States. And both have said they don't want their police departments to
 help federal agents take the boy from his relatives' home. But their emphasis
 Thursday was on keeping the peace.

 ``Any incidents will hurt Elian and hurt the United States. The only person who
 will benefit is Fidel Castro,'' Carollo told several hundred activists gathered behind
 a police barricade near the relatives' home.

 Penelas made a similar appeal immediately afterward, using the same bullhorn as
 Carollo to be heard above the boisterous crowd.

 ``It's a tense time, perhaps the most tense time here in 20 to 25 years,'' Penelas
 said. ``If there's any disorder, the only winner is Fidel Castro. So please keep
 calm.''

 Up until that point, the protesters had been uneasy, chanting ``Elian no se va''
 (Elian is not going) with an almost menacing tone.

 But the crowd broke into cheers after the two mayors delivered the news that U.S.
 Attorney General Janet Reno had promised that federal marshals would not try to
 get Elian Thursday.

 Afterward, the mood, which had been getting increasingly tense outside the
 home, relaxed considerably.

 Under both the county and the city of Miami charters, the mayor has few direct
 responsibilities beyond appointing the county or the city manager. Neither mayor
 even has direct say over his police department. That authority belongs to the
 county and city managers.

 But each mayor, by virtue of his elected position, has the bully pulpit, and each
 man used it to the fullest extent possible Thursday.

 The mayors earlier in the day also met together with leaders of the Cuban exile
 groups to urge them to keep their followers peaceful.

 ``They've made it clear that they want order,'' said Juan Perez-Franco, president of
 the Bay of Pigs Veterans Association, Brigade 2506, who attended the meeting
 on Coral Way.

 Carollo began his day with a 7 a.m. interview on the Today show, and by 10:15
 a.m. had done about 25 interviews with various local and national print, TV and
 radio reporters.

 In practically every interview, he chastised Reno for not getting representatives of
 Elian's father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, to agree to a plan he had discussed with
 Reno in which Juan Miguel and his uncle Lazaro Gonzalez would move into
 separate houses in a federal compound somewhere to ease transition of Elian
 back to his father.

 Carollo said that failure to adopt the plan meant that the Cuban government was
 dictating the terms of Elian's hand-over.

 Penelas did fewer interviews Thursday but also showed Miami's best side at every
 opportunity.

 ``People are demonstrating their emotions and they are doing it appropriately,'' he
 said, praising the protesters for keeping calm.

                     Copyright 2000 Miami Herald