S.D. Names Baltimore Official Planning Chief : Government: East Coast city’s planning director to take over department rocked last year by the sex-and-secret-payment scandal.

A planning director who helped oversee the redevelopment of downtown Baltimore will head San Diego’s planning department, filling the vacancy created in the sex-and-secret-payment scandal involving former director Robert Spaulding.

Ernest (Ernie) Freeman, 44, who has also worked as planning director in Cincinnati and Portsmouth, Va., said he was “humbled” by the opportunity of assuming the same position in the sixth-largest city in the country.

Freeman will receive a salary in the mid-$90,000 range and assume control of a department that was wracked by dissension and low morale in the wake of a former planner’s claim of sexual harassment against Spaulding.

Spaulding was forced to resign his $108,000-a-year job in 1991 after the San Diego City Council discovered that top city management had secretly approved a $98,531 settlement with former city planner Susan M. Bray.

Bray, who, like Spaulding, has filed a lawsuit against the city, claims to have consented to a sexual relationship with Spaulding only out of fear of losing her job. City officials reportedly attempted to settle Bray’s claim in the hope of averting a lawsuit.

Although Bray accepted the settlement, she later sued the city on the grounds that the arrangement was violated after it became public.

Freeman, who leaves behind a $74,000-a-year job in Baltimore, said he was aware of the low morale born of the controversy.

“I can’t change the past,” he said. “I’ll do what I can do. I listen real well and try to keep my ear to the ground. I certainly have an appreciation for what has happened in the past and view this commitment as a very serious one.

“I’m fortunate to have been selected. Some other candidates brought superior credentials and experience. This is a significant opportunity. Folks in the department there need to be confident that I’m there to help and direct but also to listen.”

City Manager Jack McGrory said Freeman was one of six finalists culled from about 100 candidates to head a department that, in the wake of the sex scandal, was placed under McGrory’s control and trimmed in size from 212 to 150, with some staff members relocated.

“I went outside because I felt it was important to bring in someone who could direct the challenge already begun in the Planning Department,” McGrory said. “And I didn’t feel I could do it with someone inside the department.”

McGrory said Freeman is known “as a real team player. Now that the Planning Department is under the control of the manager’s office, I feel it’s critical that we form a strong team between planning, engineering and development, and the building inspection department.”

City Councilman George Stevens praised McGrory’s selection of Freeman, saying in a statement that “the hiring of an African-American in a management position demonstrates the city’s commitment to cultural diversity.”

McGrory said many in the minority community “feel, and rightfully so, that they have not been able to share in our resources, and Ernie is committed to that. It’s also important for us to have ethnic diversity in top city management.”

Freeman said he perceived San Diego “as a very attractive, very dynamic kind of community that has gone through a tremendous amount of growth in the last decade . . . they’re doing cutting-edge work in planning and development.

“Being able to balance that with an enhanced environmental sensitivity is one of the things that excites me about the job. I like to focus on very manageable kinds of cities, and my perception is that, even with the growth potential, you can really get your hands on San Diego.

“It’s an area that still has a lot of growth potential--very serious growth potential. But some very conscientious considerations have to be looked at. We have to develop guidelines and perspectives on how development should occur and at what pace, and, I look forward to doing that.”

Freeman said his wife, an assistant vice president for academic planning and program development at Morgan State University, hopes to find similar employment in San Diego, but, until she does, will remain in Baltimore. The couple have a 12-year-old son.