Legislative Research Center Falls Short of Lofty Goals : Government: The California Institute has shied away from controversial issues and alienated some key backers. But officials claim it has reduced partisanship.

Amid much fanfare and lofty expectations, California leaders opened a nonprofit research center in 1991 with hopes of unifying the state’s deeply divided congressional delegation and boosting its lackluster pursuit of lucrative federal projects.

The California Institute has worked diligently since then to make the delegation--the largest in U.S. history with 54 members--a cohesive and influential force on Capitol Hill. Since its inception, the center has coordinated bipartisan meetings that had been practically nonexistent and furnished the delegation with information about legislation.

But the institute, quartered in the basement of a Capitol Hill row house, is regarded by many as a disappointment thus far. It has struggled with a minuscule budget, failed to generate much independent research, shied away from controversial issues and alienated some key backers.

The institute was formed by Republican Gov. Pete Wilson and Rep. Don Edwards (D-San Jose) with the financial backing of California corporations. It was designed to accomplish two primary goals--supply the congressional delegation with objective research on issues of critical importance to the state and develop a common approach among feuding legislators by drawing on the support of various academic, labor and business groups.

At the outset, California Democrats and Republicans hailed the institute as a potential savior for the delegation. “This entity is necessary if we are to utilize to the fullest extent the many California-connected people and institutions in the nation’s capital,” Wilson said in June, 1991.

But critics suggest that the institute was destined to struggle because of the inherent tensions involved in serving as both a nonpartisan source of information and a vehicle for political consensus. They said it is unrealistic to expect a private, nonprofit group funded primarily by the corporate sector to pull together such a large, diverse delegation.

One prominent California House member, a Democrat who spoke on the condition that he not be identified, said: “I’ve never dealt with them on anything. This is a public relations operation, pure and simple.”

Proponents say that expectations of the institute may have been too high.

“The institute hasn’t been as visible as one might have hoped,” said William B. Baker, a University of California vice president who has long argued for the need of such a center. “It’s chugging along rather than growing dramatically in importance. There is a sense of focus missing.” Still, Baker rates the organization a mild success.

The center’s executive director describes the challenge as herculean.

“I’ve always thought that this job was almost but not quite impossible,” Janet A. Denton said. “That is the room in which we’ve had to operate.”

The research center was modeled loosely after the Northeast-Midwest Institute, a coalition of 18 states created in 1978 to provide policy-makers with in-depth analysis on major issues and legislation affecting their regions. Unlike the California organization, however, the Northeast-Midwest Institute is not concerned with coalescing any of the state delegations it represents.

Today, the Northeast-Midwest Institute has a $1.2-million annual budget and 14 staff members, including eight full-time policy analysts. The budget for the California Institute has held steady at about $300,000--enough to cover the salaries of an executive director, a researcher and an office manager plus expenses. Among the institute’s 77 donors is Times Mirror Co., owner of the Los Angeles Times, which has given $5,000 in each of the last two years.

Compounding the institute’s economic woes have been differences among directors over whether the center should dig into controversial issues affecting California, such as immigration and the North American Free Trade Agreement.

Recently, before the vote on NAFTA, the institute abandoned tentative plans to hold briefings for the delegation on how the agreement would affect various California industries. The briefings were proposed by Wilson, who favored NAFTA, and supported by board member Fred J. Martin Jr., a retired Bank of America executive who heads Californians for NAFTA.

But the sessions were not held, according to institute officials, after objections were raised by Edwards and Teamsters official Chuck Mack, the labor representative on the institute board who opposed NAFTA. Edwards has maintained from the beginning that for the institute to prosper it must stay clear of any controversial or partisan issues.

“This is a little bit of a bad omen,” a top Wilson Administration official said. “If they couldn’t get over this obstacle or even anticipate it, then what does this portend for other economic issues they want to get into?”

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For the most part, the institute’s three-member staff has been preoccupied with raising money to keep its doors open rather than generating much in the way of original research. Last month, the center’s board of directors approved a revised mission statement that calls for the institute to coordinate--not develop--research from existing policy groups in California and to solicit additional funding from independent sources.

To this end, the center recently formed a California Economic Advisory Council consisting of 10 top economists from business, government, labor and California universities. It also is pursuing a $145,000 research award from the U.S. Department of Commerce and a $98,000 grant from the San Francisco-based Irvine Foundation.

“We cannot forget that this is still a young and growing organization and that we are still in the process of maturing,” Denton said. “We’re still grappling with key questions like what kinds of issues should we sponsor and what do we stand for.”

Despite the growing pains, boosters and critics alike continue to support the concept of an independent research center leading a united California front on Capitol Hill.

It was the congressional delegation’s well-publicized partisan divisions that led to the creation of the institute. The pressure on Democrats and Republicans to combine forces escalated in the mid-1980s, when California lost two large government projects--the $4.4-billion superconducting super collider to Texas and the $50-million earthquake research center to Buffalo, N.Y.

Turning the idea into reality was an effort that stretched over five years. One of the founders, Edwards, considers the institute a rousing success.

“You haven’t seen any newspaper stories in the last two years about the California congressional delegation failing to get together,” Edwards told an institute reception of 250 guests.

The Oct. 18 gala, held in the State Department’s elegant Ben Franklin diplomatic room at a cost of $12,000, is among several major accomplishments cited by the institute. These include coordinating a bipartisan task force of legislators on defense conversion and economic development, helping win a $237-million federal research contract awarded to Stanford University, producing a policy paper on how the Clinton Administration health plan would affect California and publishing a monthly newsletter that calls attention to the delegation’s work.

As perhaps its greatest feat, the institute promotes its sponsorship of a University of California orientation seminar for newly elected members of Congress in November, 1992. But university officials and corporate sponsors said the event did not warrant such rave reviews. “It was an unmitigated disaster,” said Martin, the retired Bank of America executive.

The three-day conference in San Diego drove a wedge between the business, academic and legislative leaders who attended. UC officials and faculty were left seething that their traditional academic forum had been invaded by corporate lobbyists seeking time with the delegation’s newest members. Business representatives who paid for the conference were angry that they could not participate fully in briefings for new members. The result: The institute and the university rarely have teamed up since on research projects for the benefit of the delegation.

The UC system has begun planning another seminar for newly elected members after next year’s November elections. This time, the institute has neither been invited to participate nor has it asked.

Other shortcomings were identified in April in an internal memo circulated among board members.

The memo, obtained by The Times, was written by Daniel V. Flanigan Jr., chairman of the institute’s Administration Committee. It said in part: “We have not generated a policy product that is of the professional stature needed to be of real assistance to the delegation, especially in these challenging times. . . . The materials that have been forthcoming from the institute are of a generic nature that frankly don’t give any new direction, but are more reportage of past events. This is not what the role of the institute was designed to be.”

Similarly, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said the institute has made few significant contributions during legislative battles that she has waged on behalf of the state.

“They could make a huge difference,” Feinstein said. “I don’t think that exists yet.”

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Critics, ranging from Wilson Administration officials to some California representatives from both parties, fault Executive Director Denton, who served as an administrator under former California Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr., for not doing more with the few resources she has. Denton is paid a salary of $110,000--about a third of the center’s budget.

Her supporters say the criticism is misdirected. “In many instances, she has been left to literally sustain (the institute) and raise the money by herself because she hasn’t had the kind of support that she has needed,” Martin said.

Under Denton, the institute is embarking on an expansion that calls for the center to double its budget to $600,000, hire three additional staff members and open an office in Sacramento. “We have a big dream document,” Denton said. “We hope it will inspire people because it will take something big like this to turn the state around.”