Assembly ‘Grizzlies’ Lose Some of Their Bite : Influence: Group of liberal lawmakers see their clout decline as other Democrats move toward the center.

They are known as the “Grizzly Bears,” the band of liberal Assembly Democrats who for years cut a wide swath in the state Capitol. People listened when they stood and growled.

But, as the recently completed legislative session showed, the lower house liberals have lost some of their clout. Although still a formidable political presence, the Grizzly Bears are in retreat.

They have been caught looking as the Assembly--prodded by a large freshman class dominated by moderates and a faltering state economy--has changed and become more conservative.

Pro-business and anti-immigration measures that the Grizzly Bears would have derailed or altered a few years ago were approved and sent to the governor, often pushed along by Assembly Speaker Willie Brown, their previously sympathetic political soul mate who perhaps more than anyone reflects the new tilt among Democrats.

Brown (D-San Francisco) has had increasingly frayed relationships with some liberal members, most conspicuously John Vasconcellos, the longtime representative from Santa Clara and head of the powerful Ways and Means Committee.

“The sad part is a lot of things that we are very concerned about, like caring for poor people, have been pushed to the back of the legislative burner,” said Assemblyman Tom Bates, the Berkeley Democrat who founded the Grizzlies in the early 1980s.

The name comes from the grizzly bear on the California flag. The group, whose members were often instrumental on issues such as environmental protection, education and welfare, used to meet at least once a month and sometimes more often.

Bates, chairman of the Assembly Human Services Committee, says the group has not met in more than a year.

One reason Assembly liberals are on their heels, Bates said, is the move toward the political center by Brown, which has diminished their power.

Brown’s power lies in keeping the majority of Democrats happy. Brown, the consummate political animal, would risk the speakership if his policies failed to reflect the changes in the Democratic majority.

Bates noted that Brown championed the bill that gives manufacturers a tax break, which Republican Gov. Pete Wilson supports and has signed into law.

“He (Brown) has legitimized things like tax breaks for business and welfare cuts,” Bates said. “He provides political cover for other people who want to go along. So a lot of it (the loss of liberal clout) has to be laid at his doorstep.”

In response, Brown said: “Mr. Bates is entitled to his opinion. I am simply trying to do the job of helping to keep the state of California afloat. I don’t think the liberals have lost their influence. I consider myself a liberal, and if you go down the list of Assembly committee chairmen, you will see liberal leaders of many important committees.”

Brown specifically cited Vasconcellos; Byron Sher (D-Palo Alto), chairman of the Natural Resources Committee; Burt Margolin (D-Los Angeles), chairman of the Health Committee; John Burton (D-San Francisco), chairman of Rules Committee, and Bates.

In recent years, several prominent liberals have left the Assembly.

They include Tom Hayden of Santa Monica, the former Vietnam War protester who moved up to the state Senate; Art Agnos of San Francisco, who departed to become mayor of that city; Gloria Molina of Los Angeles, who left to become a city councilwoman and then county supervisor; Richard Alatorre of Los Angeles, who became a city councilman; Mike Roos of Los Angeles, now the president of Los Angeles Educational Alliance for Restructuring Now (LEARN); Maxine Waters of Los Angeles, who went on to Congress; Sam Farr of Carmel, who also went to Congress, and Peter Chacon of San Diego, who retired.

“We are a victim of the shift from the left in the ‘60s to the right in the ‘90s,” said Assemblyman Robert J. Campbell (D-Martinez), a charter member of the group. “There used to be 25 to 27 liberal Democrats in the Assembly. There probably are only a dozen or so left now.”

Campbell added: “Some people who want to get reelected have changed their beliefs about things like opposing the death penalty. I can’t do that. I always have opposed the death penalty. And I always will.”

One of those key Democrats who have switched is Brown, who supports capital punishment for California’s worst killers.

Assembly Democratic caucus Chairman Jim Costa of Hanford, a moderate, says Assembly liberals are a victim of California’s worst economy since the Depression of the 1930s.

“The go-go years are gone,” Costa said. “The money just isn’t there (for various government programs.) Whether you consider yourself to be a liberal or a moderate or a conservative, that’s a reality that everyone has to deal with.”

Another reality was the addition this year of a large batch of new Assembly members, the first elected since voters approved term limits. Fifteen are Democrats, many of whom are moderates and may have helped moved the caucus toward the political center.

“Things are changing in the 1990s,” said first-term Assemblyman Louis Caldera (D-Los Angeles). “We are more interested in solving the problems that the voters want us to solve than in party labels.”

On some issues, liberals remain influential. Assemblyman Terry B. Friedman (D-Brentwood), chairman of the Labor and Employment Committee, says “on environmental and consumer protection issues, we are still quite strong.”

Friedman pointed to the California Environmental Quality Act that made it through the Legislature, which made relatively modest changes to the state’s top environmental protection law to help businesses deal with its many regulations.

Changing the law was among the leading legislative priorities of California business, who argued that the measure--which they described as cumbersome and onerous--was hurting the state’s business climate. Alarmed by what they viewed as a major political assault against the measure, environmentalists turned to Sher, the Palo Alto liberal and steadfast defender of the act.

Sher, realizing a hands-off defense was no longer politically viable, worked with business leaders, environmentalists and Republicans to fashion a compromise that streamlined some of the act’s regulatory demands while leaving its environmental protections intact.

“Part of my objective was to make sure these reforms did not undercut the basic purpose of (the Environmental Quality Act), which is to protect the environment,” Sher said. “There has been tremendous turnover in the Assembly and in our caucus. There are many new independent thinkers, but nobody wants to do wholesale damage to the environment. I am satisfied that we did protect the environment.”

Although harder to quantify, political relationships between some liberal have become frayed. The best example is a flare-up between Brown and Vasconcellos, friends since 1966. Vasconcellos has been chairman of the Ways and Means Committee since 1980.

Brown says he is seriously considering dividing Vasconcellos’ committee into two panels--one for the budget, the other for appropriations--because of the heavy workload, a move that would greatly dilute Vasconcellos’ influence.

Brown and Vasconcellos were at odds during the end of the last session. Vasconcellos angered Brown by being the lone Democrat to vote against the budget that Brown wanted enacted in time for the July 1 start of the new fiscal year. Brown angered Vasconcellos by jumping in at the last minute and taking over the crafting of the budget.

Vasconcellos called Brown’s proposed spending program “stupid and obnoxious,” saying it gave too much money to police and prisons and not enough to the poor and needy.

Ironically, Vasconcellos’ alternative budget proposal also reflected the new fiscal times and included cuts in welfare benefits and elimination of the renters tax credit.

“I was trying to produce a budget and he (Vasconcellos) was trying to stop it,” Brown snapped to reporters after the budget passed. “I don’t spend any time messing around with people who are trying to block me.”

Vasconcellos again angered Brown on the last night of the session, when he tried to push through a rival manufacturers tax-break bill less generous to business than the one sponsored by Brown.

But Brown, invoking a parliamentary maneuver, blunted Vasconcellos, leaving the Northern California lawmaker standing open-mouthed on the Assembly floor, his microphone up with nothing to say.

Vasconcellos, who ended up supporting Brown’s tax-break bill, says he is not on the outs with the Speaker and downplayed any acrimony.

“You (press) people are always looking for scoops and I’m getting sick and tired of it,” he snarled recently. “My life is too full to be worried about this kind of thing. Willie and I have a deep and profound friendship. Like two people in a marriage, we disagree sometimes. We fight, but it always heals.”