Non-Physician Named to Head Health Agency : Government: Appointment of Wilson aide Kimberly Belshe prompts concern from one group that she fought 1988 anti-smoking initiative while at public relations firm.

Gov. Pete Wilson on Tuesday appointed Kimberly Belshe, an adviser who once handled public relations for the tobacco industry, as the state’s new director of health services.

Wilson said Belshe, 33, deputy secretary for program and fiscal affairs in the Health and Welfare Agency, would assume the post vacated by Molly Coye, a physician who resigned to become a vice president for a network of hospitals.

Before she went to work for Wilson, Belshe for a time helped tobacco interests in their attempts to defeat Proposition 99, the 1988 anti-smoking initiative.

Describing Belshe as one of his “most gifted” advisers, Wilson said: “Her grasp of health policy and her command of detail make her an exceptional manager and leader.”

He said Belshe has been a key architect of many of the health programs initiated by his Administration, including Health Insurance Plan for California (HIPC), a program to aid small businesses in providing health insurance coverage; Education Now and Babies Later (ENABL), an effort to discourage teen-age pregnancy, and Access to Infants and Mothers (AIM), a program to provide prenatal care to uninsured women.

But a representative of at least one health care advocacy group, the American Lung Assn. of California, said he had some concerns about her relationship with the tobacco industry’s unsuccessful campaign to defeat Proposition 99 in 1988.

Belshe said in a telephone interview Tuesday that while employed by the San Francisco public relations firm of Ogilvy & Mather she had helped its tobacco industry clients oppose the anti-smoking initiative.

As health services director, Belshe will direct the state’s anti-smoking programs and play a pivotal role in formulating the strategy to combat smoking.

Expressing concern that her role in the Proposition 99 fight might become “overblown,” Belshe said she had always been a “strident” supporter of efforts to cut down on smoking and to reduce secondhand smoke. Belshe said she has always been a nonsmoker and described herself as a “healthnik.”

She said she had worked for the public relations firm for only a short time, and it was unfair to suggest that any assignments she had there had “an ongoing impact on my personal views.”

Tony Najera, the lung association’s vice president for government relations, said, “We hope as director of health services that she will do nothing to diminish what has perhaps become the most successful public health program in the state of California.”

Najera said he was somewhat disturbed that Belshe had worked on the implementation of Proposition 99 while with the state health agency but never disclosed to health care advocates her past relationship with the tobacco industry. Najera said he did not find out about it until recently and “I was stunned.”

In announcing Belshe’s appointment, the governor’s office noted that she had worked on an AIDS education campaign while employed by Ogilvy & Mather but made no mention of her involvement with smoking issues.

Najera said, however, that Belshe had called his organization shortly after her appointment was announced, and he believed the call was an indication of her willingness to work with anti-smoking advocates.

Although Belshe is one of the few non-physicians to be appointed as health director, her selection received a strong endorsement from the California Medical Assn., the state’s largest physician organization. Robert Elsner, chief executive officer of the CMA, said that the organization traditionally has preferred a physician in the health services post, but it has had a long working relationship with Belshe. “We feel that it was a good appointment and we’re very supportive,” he said.