Chacon to End 22-Year Career as Assemblyman

Eight years after he first suggested that he was considering retirement, Assemblyman Pete Chacon (D-San Diego) applied deed to thought on Tuesday, announcing that he will end his 22-year career when his term expires this fall.

The 66-year-old lawmaker, who faced a potentially tough June primary battle against fellow Democratic Assemblyman Steve Peace because of redistricting, released a two-page statement late Tuesday saying simply that he had decided to step down to spend more time with his family.

“I’m proud of the service I have given to the people of San Diego,” Chacon said. “However, I’ve decided that it’s time for me to be a full-time husband and father and to simply enjoy life.”

In recent years, Chacon’s vagueness about his future plans, combined with rumors perhaps initiated by aspirants eager to succeed him in the county’s most heavily Democratic legislative district, made the will-he-or-won’t-he-retire questions a popular biennial guessing game both here and in Sacramento.

Chacon’s gradual severing of his ties to San Diego--notably, by making his primary home in Placerville, near Sacramento--also fostered the impression that Chacon’s interest in both the job and the 79th District had waned, a perception that kept Chacon on the defensive in his recent races.

Though Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco) dispatched two of his top political operatives to help Chacon in his 1990 contest, the speaker also revived rumors that Chacon might retire--indeed, that he perhaps was nudging Chacon in that direction--by predicting last month that Chacon and Peace would avoid a primary battle in the reconfigured 79th District.

“I’m certain some accommodation is going to be worked out between them,” Brown said.

The speaker’s comments further spread rumors of a deal under which Chacon would retire to give an open seat to Peace, whose aggressiveness and fund-raising ability far outpaced his own. While both principals denied that such a deal had been made, Chacon was widely seen within political circles as being unwilling to enter a bruising primary with the potential to end his career with a loss rather than the more diplomatic exit afforded by retirement.

Neither Chacon nor Peace could be reached for comment Tuesday. However, Chacon’s top aide, David Valladolid, denied that Chacon had been pressured into retiring.

“There was no suggestion by anyone that he should leave, even though I’m sure some will see it that way,” Valladolid said. “His family had been requesting for some time that he devote more time to his personal life, and that’s what finally made up his mind.”

As highlights of his 11-term record, Chacon pointed to legislation that established bilingual education, produced low-income housing, outlawed the mandatory retirement age, created a toll-free hot line for runaway youths and developed a comprehensive prenatal care system.

Chairman of the Assembly’s Elections, Reapportionment and Constitutional Amendments Committee, Chacon also relentlessly but unsuccessfully pushed in recent years for district elections for all city councils and school boards. Vetoed by Gov. Pete Wilson and former Gov. George Deukmejian, both Republicans, Chacon’s bill would have, he argued, dramatically enhanced minority representation throughout California.

Chacon’s recent years in the Assembly, however, were marked less by major legislative achievements than by a series of embarrassing inquiries into his ethics and overall performance. A 1990 California Journal article ranked him next-to-last in overall effectiveness in the Assembly, and he faced questions in his last campaign over his acceptance of $7,500 from a check cashers’ organization in 1988 after he abandoned legislation opposed by the group that would have capped check-cashing fees.

Though the state attorney general’s office concluded that there was insufficient evidence to charge Chacon with accepting a bribe--he insists that the timing of the payment was a coincidence and that the committee chairman, not he, scuttled the bill--his critics charged that the episode at least raised serious ethical questions.