Dean Schultz Expected to Get FHLB Post

Dean M. Schultz, a longtime thrift industry lawyer and executive, is expected to be named today to head the Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco, a quasi-government agency that mostly provides credit to savings and loans, sources said Tuesday.

Schultz is executive vice president and chief operating officer of the Federal Home Loan Bank of New York. He will replace James M. Cirona, who resigned abruptly in January as head of the bank.

Officials in the bank office could not be reached for comment. Golden West Financial Chairman Herbert M. Sandler, who serves as the bank’s vice chairman, declined to comment.

Before 1989, the San Francisco office was the primary regulator of savings and loan in California, Arizona and Nevada, operating as part of the Federal Home Loan Bank Board system. But the federal thrift bailout law that year split the bank board into two pieces. Supervision is now handled by the Office of Thrift Supervision.

Filling in for Cirona temporarily has been Paul D. Hill, executive vice president and chief operating officer at the Federal Home Loan Bank of Atlanta.

Cirona became known nationally for his role in heading the San Francisco office when it was fighting to crack down on Lincoln Savings & Loan and its former owner, Charles H. Keating Jr. He was present at a now-famous April, 1987, meeting in which it was later alleged that five U.S. senators tried to influence regulators dealing with Keating.