Council OKs New City Treasurer : Government: Phoenix tax attorney J. Paul Brownridge will take command of office beset by difficulties linked to investigation of Mayor Tom Bradley’s finances.

Phoenix tax attorney J. Paul Brownridge was sworn in Wednesday as the new Los Angeles city treasurer after a unanimous vote of approval from the City Council.

Brownridge was selected by Mayor Tom Bradley for the $99,000-a-year job after a 10-month nationwide search to replace former Treasurer Leonard Rittenberg, who resigned last year amid allegations about his role in a scandal involving Bradley’s personal finances.

In an interview Wednesday, Brownridge said he plans to be an active treasurer who will reinvigorate the beleaguered treasurer’s office and find ways to earn greater returns on the city’s money. The office has 50 employees who manage an investment portfolio of $2.3 billion.

“My investment portfolio is not black or white or yellow or brown. It is green,” Brownridge said. “I look to generate the maximum amount of money . . . that is second only to safety.”

The council had few questions for Brownridge and apparently was largely unaware of problems in his recent past, including a dispute with his Grand Rapids, Mich., superiors, who placed him on probation in 1988 as that city’s treasurer.

A Colorado appeals court also has awarded three years of back pay to a woman Brownridge fired while he worked for the city of Denver in the mid 1980s. She claimed that Brownridge, who is black, fired her because she is white.

Councilman Nate Holden declared Brownridge “overqualified” for the job and Zev Yaroslavsky, the council’s fiscal watchdog, said he was “particularly impressed” with the 45-year-old financial adviser.

Bill Chandler, a spokesman for Bradley said the mayor knew of the incidents and had thoroughly investigated them with the assistance of the city’s Personnel Department. Bradley has complete confidence in Brownridge’s ability to manage the treasurer’s office, Chandler said.

“The mayor is not one to base a decision on rumor and hearsay,” Chandler said. “He wants the facts. It was clear that Paul Brownridge was the most skillful and best qualified candidate.”

Brownridge downplayed his troubles in Grand Rapids as a personality conflict and denied the discrimination allegation made in the Denver case. He said the lawsuit was won on a technicality.

Brownridge was among six candidates whose names were submitted to Bradley after a series of interviews conducted through the Personnel Department, according to John J. Driscoll, head of the department. Three scored higher than Brownridge, but one dropped out, placing Brownridge third on the list, Driscoll said.

Driscoll said he was asked by Bradley to look into the discrimination allegation as well as the situation in Grand Rapids and was satisfied that the matters were of little significance.

The Los Angeles treasurer’s office was thrust into the spotlight two years ago with reports about its placement of deposits in the Far East National Bank, for which Bradley had been a paid consultant.

After a phone call from Bradley, Rittenberg decided on March 22, 1989, to invest in Far East without competitive bidding. Rittenberg and Bradley both have said that the mayor did not attempt to influence the decision. Bradley returned his $18,000 fee from the bank in early 1989.

A series of inquiries and City Council hearings ensued, and testimony indicated ambiguity and confusion in the office’s investment policies, especially concerning minority banks.

Asked what he would do if a public official called him to request a favor, Brownridge said: “We will follow the rules. Period.”

Brownridge has worked as a tax attorney and financial adviser in Phoenix, where he moved in 1989 after spending a year as treasurer in Chicago. He left Chicago after Richard M. Daley was elected mayor and chose his own treasurer.