Turnover High for Feinstein’s D.C. Office : Personnel: Fourteen aides have quit or been fired in less than six months. But that does not faze the first-year senator, who has a reputation for being a demanding boss.

In the first sign of turbulence for a popular first-year senator, Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) has lost 14 aides from her Capitol Hill office in less than six months.

Eleven employees have quit, including six top-paid staffers who worked closely with Feinstein on important legislative and administrative matters. Three clerical aides were fired.

This much turnover is considered unusual even for a newcomer in a legislative body where personnel changes are commonplace. By comparison, a total of three aides have left the Washington staff of Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) since she took office in January.

The staff losses do not faze Feinstein, 59, who has developed a reputation as a demanding boss over the years. The former San Francisco mayor has been known to tell prospective employees: “I don’t get ulcers, I give them.”

In separate interviews, four former Feinstein staffers said they resigned in part because the senator was a “difficult” boss and her office an “unpleasant” environment. They complained that Feinstein frequently piled work on a skeleton staff, then wondered aloud why some aides had to work 70 hours a week. They said some staffers occasionally were on the verge of tears after being harshly criticized by Feinstein.

The aides spoke only on the condition of anonymity, saying they feared reprisals from a Democratic-controlled Administration and Congress.

Feinstein said the staff defections, including the departure of her top two advisers, have not adversely affected the operation of her Washington office. On the contrary, she said, her legislative staff is more productive after the changes.

“The people from a very large and very troubled state have elected me to represent them,” Feinstein said. “I think I’m entitled to have the kind of team to do it.”

Feinstein offered several reasons why she has lost more than a third of her original staff: She imposed a 25% cut in office expenses that required lower salaries and more work; she had to assemble a staff hastily when she was sworn into office one week after the November election; she is unaccustomed to dealing with the Washington bureaucracy; she lost several aides to better jobs, and she may be at a disadvantage because of her gender.

“I think when a man is strong, it is expected. When a woman is, it is not,” Feinstein said. “My experience is just that people tend to accept things much more easily very often from a man than from a woman.”

Feinstein has responded to the staff turnover by enacting some changes in her Senate operation.

She recently added 11 new positions in Washington to ease the workload, promoted eight staffers and raised some annual salaries by $2,000. Feinstein said she still will be able to keep her campaign pledge to cut office expenses by 25% this year.

Regarded by many Washington insiders as the star of the Senate freshman class, Feinstein has had an impressive, high-profile start in Congress. She glistened during the Senate Judiciary Committee’s confirmation hearings on failed attorney general nominee Zoe Baird with her pointed and direct questioning. She has proven a persistent advocate for her state’s funding needs as the first Californian in 24 years to sit on the Senate Appropriations Committee.

However, as a result of the staff resignations, top congressional staffers are expressing less interest in working for the California senator, according to three senior Democratic aides. One Senate staffer who was being courted by Feinstein’s office said he recently withdrew his application after learning of her difficult reputation.

Feinstein said she has seen no drop in resumes from job seekers.

The staff turnover also underscores Feinstein’s transition from being a chief executive of a major city to one of 100 members of a legislative body. Several staffers said that Feinstein is deeply frustrated by her inability as a freshman legislator to change an institution where power is tightly controlled by a few committee chairmen with decades of seniority.

Feinstein is the first to acknowledge that her adjustment to Washington has not been easy. As mayor of San Francisco, Feinstein said, she was surrounded by older, highly paid administrators and department heads who were responsive to her orders and protective of her image.

“Washington is totally different,” Feinstein said. “I find the Hill kind of its own little insidious nest of people who aren’t necessarily loyal to anything or anyone. And I’m not accustomed to that.”

Feinstein’s office refused to provide The Times with a list of departed staffers and the dates they resigned or a roster of new staffers, their hiring dates and salaries. Such payroll information is public, but is not immediately available under Senate rules.

Based on Senate documents and interviews, The Times confirmed that 14 aides left Feinstein’s office between January and late May. Six aides who resigned were among the nine highest-paid people in Feinstein’s Washington office. Five others who quit voluntarily held positions as legislative and clerical aides. In addition, two receptionists and a computer operator were dismissed.

Many of her former aides declined to comment. But in explaining their departures, four recalled staff meetings that tied up the entire office for hours as Feinstein berated staffers for not finishing tasks on time or to her satisfaction. Some said they were offended that, despite routinely working late nights and weekends, Feinstein required them to sign sheets indicating when they arrived at the office and left. These staffers said their complaints were forwarded to Feinstein, but they saw no signs that their concerns were addressed.

“I think she was completely overwhelmed because so much is going on. I think she is used to being in control,” said one former staffer. “There was a sense of a loss of that. She wasn’t exactly certain exactly what was going on.”

Feinstein acknowledged that she was deeply frustrated in the early going by the inability of her staff to handle 100,000 pieces of mail and 5,000 telephone calls a week.

“I’m the first one to admit that the workload is very great,” Feinstein said. “I think there was a period where the operations were not performing, and I think I found out why and I remedied that. I am very much more relaxed than I was; there is no question about that.”

Other staffers defended Feinstein, describing her as a hard-working, conscientious senator who demands no more of her employees than she does of herself.

Barbara Larkin, the former legislative director who resigned to become a deputy assistant secretary in the State Department, called reports regarding the senator’s harsh treatment of employees “grossly exaggerated.”

“I have never seen her do anything I would call abusive,” Larkin said. “She is a tough, very bright woman who works hard and has high standards for people. Yeah, she chews people out. I don’t know any senator here who doesn’t.”

Larkin attributed the large turnover to a combination of better offers and the normal learning process of a new senator.

Feinstein has earned the reputation of being a tough boss in previous high-profile roles.

In “Storming the Statehouse,” a book about Feinstein and her campaign for governor in 1990, author Celia Morris wrote that some staffers in the mayor’s office “called her imperious, hectoring and even abusive, claiming that she would dress down a hapless victim in front of others and would neither apologize nor admit it if she proved to be mistaken.”

Jim Lazarus, Feinstein’s former deputy mayor and now chief of staff to San Francisco Mayor Frank Jordan, said: “She was difficult to work for, but it was a positive experience. To be honest with you, she probably felt like firing everybody at least once, and everybody felt like ‘I can’t take it anymore’ at least once. She is demanding of herself and demanding of everybody around her. She works 24 hours a day. She is a perfectionist.”

Feinstein Staff Changes

Since January, 14 aides have left the Washington office of first-year Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.). Eleven staffers resigned and three were fired. This chart lists the nine highest-paid employees on Feinstein’s original Washington staff, including six who quit.

STAFFER TITLE SALARY HIRED RESIGNED Jon Haber Chief of staff $85,000 Jan. 3 April 30 Barbara Larkin Legis. director 84,000 Jan. 3 May 28 Bill Chandler* Press secretary 75,000 Nov. 19 Kathryn Lacey* Dep. leg. director 75,000 Jan. 3 Phyllis Cuttino Admin. director 50,000 Nov. 17 May 28 Ellen Marshall Legislative asst. 40,000 Jan. 15 March 18 Kathryn Refine Legislative asst. 40,000 Jan. 19 April 20 Mark Kadesh* Legislative asst. 40,000 Jan. 20 Mary Beth Simcik Executive asst. 38,000 Jan. 21 April 20

* Still on Feinstein’s staff

Sources: Secretary of the Senate, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, interviews