Salary Plan Would Boost Pensions for Deukmejian and Van de Kamp : Pay: Governor’s retirement would be $72,000 annually; the attorney general’s $40,000.

Proposed salary increases for state constitutional officers and legislators, slated to go into effect Dec. 3, would also give Gov. George Deukmejian a $21,000 higher annual pension, bringing his total to $72,000. Atty. Gen. John K. Van de Kamp would get a pension increase of $9,000, to $40,000 annually.

Even if Deukmejian and Van de Kamp served only one day at their higher salaries, they would be entitled to the increases, David Tirapelle, director of the state Department of Personnel Administration, said Monday. Each will have served about a month.

The increases would result from a provision in state law providing that a retired official’s pension is based on the highest salary he or she received before leaving office. Officials’ pensions also get a cost-of-living increase each year, so the higher base would lead to future increases.

Last week, the new California Citizens Compensation Commission, created by Proposition 112 last June and then appointed by Deukmejian, tentatively decided to raise the governor’s salary by 41%, from an annual $85,000 to $120,000, the attorney general’s salary from $77,500 to $102,000, and legislators’ base salary from $40,816 to $52,500.

The commission has scheduled a public hearing on the matter Nov. 30, but has indicated that it will adopt the salary hikes with the increases to go into effect Dec. 3.

Because Dec. 3 is the day the new Legislature convenes, departing legislators would not be eligible for higher pensions, but Deukmejian and Van de Kamp, serving until January before giving up their offices, would be.

Deukmejian’s press secretary, Robert Gore, said that comment on the governor’s prospective higher pension would be premature because the salary increases are not final.

A spokeswoman for Van de Kamp said the attorney general was ill with the flu and unavailable for comment.

A member of the Citizens Compensation Commission, George Nesterczuk, a Washington, D.C. management consultant, said that commissioners knew the salary recommendations would trigger pension increases, but did not know how much in individual cases.

Nonetheless, Nesterczuk said, “If I were asked to take Mr. Deukmejian or Mr. Van de Kamp’s pension into account at this point, it would seem punitive to reduce the increases we have agreed upon.

“I don’t see that it is appropriate for us to be making a salary decision on the basis of its impact on pension benefits,” Nesterczuk said. A friend of Deukmejian’s executive secretary, Michael Frost, Nesterczuk was the only non-Californian on the commission.

Commission Chairman Claude S. Brinegar, a Union Oil vice president who was U.S. transportation secretary in the Richard M. Nixon Administration, agreed with Nesterczuk’s remarks and added: “I would note that the statute called for us to make a decision effective Dec. 3. The only alternative would be to put it off for a year, and that would be certainly punitive to the new governor.”

The commission’s tentative salary increase decisions last week came two days after it was revealed that state officials were instrumental in withholding a $17 monthly increase in benefits to 849,000 poor and disabled Californians because of state budgetary problems.

On the same day the commission made its tentative decisions, Deukmejian proposed $1 billion in state budget cuts, including $546 million for schools, on grounds that the state could not afford the budget adopted earlier this year.

Supporters of Proposition 112 wanted to reduce the outside income legislators could receive, while setting up an independent commission to annually set their salaries commensurate with other states.

Common Cause, the citizens’ lobby group, campaigned heavily for the measure, and its Sacramento lobbyist, Ruth Holton, said she believes Proposition 112 was worthwhile even if big pension increases result.

“You can’t be perfect, and unfortunately, yes, there are some problems,” she said. “But setting the salaries this way is less of a conflict than when the Legislature did it.”