Having Problems with DB_Table mappings in memory

I am using a database feed with extremely poor field names, many have spaces in the name (e.g. "List Date") and one even has a pound sign ("MLS #"). This is a real pain for me because I'm trying to map that database to memory and it's giving my tempate engine (smarty) all kinds of trouble. Is there a way to MAP the DB_Table structure in memory as something different (e.g. map "MLS #" as "MLS_num" in php)? I'm trying to think of any solution that isn't too cumbersome or expensive (I don't want to have to loop through a very large associative array to remap all the names). Any ideas? Please help! Jay