Bernson Replaces 2 on Campaign Staff in Shakeup : Runoff: An Orange County-based consultant is named to advise the councilman on strategy and to produce mailers for the June election.

Shaking up his campaign staff after his weak showing in the April 9 primary election, Los Angeles City Councilman Hal Bernson has replaced a key political adviser and a consultant who produced his direct-mail brochures.

Bernson, who faces a tough runoff campaign against Los Angeles Board of Education member Julie Korenstein, also intends to speak directly to news reporters, rather than through a press consultant, for the balance of the race.

The changes come less than two weeks after Korenstein forced Bernson into a June 4 runoff for his northwest San Fernando Valley seat. Although he led the balloting against Korenstein and four other challengers in the primary, Bernson garnered only 34.7% of the vote, the worst showing of a council incumbent since 1971.

Bernson spokesman Greig Smith described the staff moves as “small changes in the management team.” He said Bernson had too many advisers working in different locations during the primary, which, he said, hurt his ability to formulate and execute a unified campaign strategy.

“It was scattered around and it wasn’t effective,” he said. “It was by committee and that is not an effective way to do it.”

Smith said Bernson has hired Harvey Englander, a well-known political consultant based in Orange County, to advise him on strategy and to produce campaign mail for the runoff campaign.

Englander replaces Ron Biron, a key Bernson political adviser who is deputy executive officer of the state Senate Rules Committee, and Robert Gouty, a Covina-based mail consultant who generally works for conservative candidates.

Biron, a longtime friend who was Bernson’s campaign manager when he was elected to the City Council in 1979, played a central role in devising Bernson’s campaign strategy during the primary race.

Among the other chief strategists were Bernson himself and Joseph Cerrell, founder of Cerrell Associates Inc., a Los Angeles political consulting firm.

Early in the campaign, Bernson predicted he would win reelection in the primary by running up a 50%-plus-one majority of votes. Despite a barrage of attacks from Korenstein and his other challengers, Bernson largely refrained from returning fire. Some political observers criticized that strategy, saying it reflected the complacency of an incumbent who believed he was coasting toward reelection.

According to a source who asked not to be identified, Biron received no salary but was reimbursed for travel expenses. Bernson asked Biron to work for his campaign full time in the Valley, but Biron could not leave his Sacramento job, the source said.

Biron could not be reached for comment Monday.

Gouty, whose recent clients include state Assemblyman Richard L. Mountjoy (R-Monrovia), produced a number of mailers for Bernson during the primary, including one in which Bernson criticized an earlier brochure by Korenstein--his only real attack on her during the primary race.

Smith said the design of that mailer was very confusing and Bernson was very disappointed in it, although he remains on friendly terms with Gouty.

Gouty said “those are value judgments” and that campaign mailers are usually reviewed by the candidate or his chief aides before they are sent out.

Smith said Bernson plans to speak directly to news media representatives for the rest of the campaign, taking over that role from Hal Dash, president of Cerrell Associates.

Smith said that because Dash works in an office in Los Angeles, he made some comments to reporters that “were not in sync with what was going on” in Bernson’s campaign in the Valley.

“He’s sitting over there on Larchmont, speaking for a campaign in the Valley. . . . Quite often he was winging it. He was working with the best information he had at the time, but it was somewhat removed,” Smith said.

Smith denied persistent rumors that Bernson had fired the Cerrell firm, saying it will continue to provide political advice for the runoff.

But Englander said it was his understanding that Cerrell is no longer involved in Bernson’s campaign.