Term Limits Taking a Big Toll on Legislature : Politics: Proposition 140 was intended to bring in new leaders. It has succeeded. But the question remains: Has the turnover improved the quality of government?

By JERRY GILLAM

March 20, 1994 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

SACRAMENTO —

Term limits are beginning to take their toll on the state Legislature, as nearly one-quarter of its members are running for other offices or retiring this year, a large turnover that continues a trend that began two years ago.

In all, 29 of the 120 lawmakers in the Senate and Assembly are seeking to move along. Twenty-two are in the Assembly, where incumbents are limited to three, two-year terms, and seven are in the Senate, where the limit is two, four-year terms.

The exodus resembles what occurred in 1992, the first election under term limits, when 27 freshman members were elected to the Assembly and four lower house incumbents moved on to the Senate. By next year, more than half of the 80-member Assembly will be term limit lawmakers, a dramatic change in just a few years.

The intent of Proposition 140, the 1990 initiative that imposed term limits on the Legislature and those holding statewide office, was to force out career politicians and create a revolving door guaranteed to bring in new leaders.

So far, according to term limit supporters, that part of the initiative is working as advertised as new legislators quickly replace the old.

What is harder to gauge, because term limits are so new, is whether the change has improved state government.

Whether the Legislature is more responsive to the public, whether special interests and lobbyists are taking more control, whether the new lawmakers are more concerned about public policy than reelection, whether, in the end, there is any discernible difference, are questions without answers for now.

What is clear is that term limits are pressuring politicians to make decisions about the direction of their careers.

One of the first incumbents to announce he was leaving because of term limits in 1992 was 10-year Assemblyman Bruce Bronzan (D-Fresno), chairman of the Health Committee, who resigned to take a job as associate dean for the University of California at the San Francisco School of Medicine.

Asked about his decision, Bronzan said: “It’s simple. If you know there is absolutely no future in what you’re doing, and you have two years, four years maximum left, what do you do?

“Do you wait until the end of your term to decide what to do with the rest of your life? No. When the best opportunity comes up for you, that’s right for the kind of future you want for yourself, you’ll take it.”

Others see their opportunity in another political office, either as a constitutional officeholder or, as in the case of several Assembly members, in the Senate. Either way, the result is a new political time clock.

“Term limits crystallized things for me,” said Assemblyman Rusty Areias (D-San Jose), who is running for state controller. “I really don’t want to be here (in the Assembly) during the last two years when all of these people are going to be leaving and things are shutting down. The Assembly is going to be a much different place than it was before.”

Veteran Sen. Robert Presley (D-Riverside), who is running for the State Board of Equalization seat, said: “I would have only one more four-year Senate term, but I possibly could have eight more years on the State Board of Equalization.”

One result of this political musical chairs has been $13 million in local costs for special elections required to fill Assembly and Senate vacancies, according to the secretary of state’s office, an expense that is likely to recur. The state is reimbursing counties for $8 million of special election costs in 1993.

Many of those in the Legislature remain convinced that term limits are misguided and that the public has thrown open the door to special-interest wolves and obstinate bureaucrats who will either feast on or ignore inexperienced lawmakers to the detriment of the public good.

Among the most outspoken on that point is Assembly Speaker Willie Brown, the San Francisco Democrat who must leave his powerful post in two years after 32 years in the Assembly. Brown has been Speaker longer than anyone in the state’s history. He is considering a run for a state Senate seat when his Assembly career is over.

“I hate term limits even more now because it is coming to the time where they personally affect me,” Brown said. “I’m taking it personal now, but term limits really hurt the legislative delivery system. There is a such a thing as institutional memory that is of tremendous value in the decision-making process. You can’t just come into the halls of the Legislature and become a good legislator. The job doesn’t lend itself to your learning all about it the day that you are elected.”

Brown said another major weakness of term limits is that new lawmakers will immediately start searching for their next job.

“You have folks who are full-time looking for another job,” he said. “They know they’re terminal from the day they’re first elected.”

Supporters of term limits say the ongoing changing of the guard is exactly what they had in mind.

Former Los Angeles County Supervisor and Republican Assemblyman Pete Schabarum of Covina, the man generally credited with getting Proposition 140 on the ballot, said he is pleased with the way it is working.

“Yes, term limits are beginning to produce the desired results,” Schabarum said. “That’s a lot of old faces who won’t be in the Assembly and the Senate next year--and a lot of new faces who will be.

“This is exactly what term limits were supposed to do. I’m glad I did it. And I’m as convinced today as I was four years ago that it is very appropriate for good government.”

Assembly Republican Leader Jim Brulte of Rancho Cucamonga agrees with Schabarum’s assessment. The GOP, which supported term limits, believes that it stands to increase its numbers in both houses, in part because entrenched Democratic incumbents are being forced to leave.

“I think term limits are the best public policy innovation in this century,” Brulte said. “The average chief executive officer of a major corporation in this country spends six to eight years in that job and then moves on.”

Members of the 1992 Assembly freshman class, the first elected under term limits, say they are well aware of their short political life span and work to compensate for that.

“You know you only have a limited time in which to accomplish the things you want to do,” said Assemblyman Louis Caldera (D-Los Angeles), who has received high marks from his colleagues. “You’ve got to learn the ins and outs of what it takes to gain support for your bills. You also have to be extremely focused about convincing others to see things your way.”

One of the most difficult things to gauge is what impact term limits have had on lobbyists and the state bureaucracy.

The conventional wisdom, at least that which emanates from many in the Legislature, is that veteran lobbyists and state bureaucrats will have the upper hand because the newcomers will turn to them for advice.

The counter argument is that lobbyists and bureaucrats will lose their hard-earned influence built up over the years with veteran legislators because they will not be able to manipulate the newcomers as easily.

A top lobbyist, Dennis E. Carpenter, who was a state senator from Orange County, said: “I suppose the lobbyists and the bureaucrats get more influence in the context that they become a more select crowd of people who know what the hell is going on and how to do things, so their advantage widens as you get greenhorns in the Legislature who don’t know these things.

“On the other hand, the idea that either lobbyists or bureaucrats are going to run away with control of the whole legislative apparatus seems to me to be far-fetched.”

As for term limits, Carpenter said: “Term limits have the distinct arguable advantage of getting rid of dead weight and people who should have retired or don’t bring much to the party. But, on the other hand, it also gets rid of the geniuses, the properly motivated and the good people, too, who I think are more important to the process than the bad ones.”

In addition to imposing term limits, Proposition 140 called for a 38% cut in the Legislature’s staff budget, which prompted many experienced and knowledgeable staffers to take other jobs.

But many Capitol observers believe the inner workings of the Legislature continue to operate much as they did prior to Proposition 140. “It was not the end of the world,” Carpenter said.

In addition to legislative term limits, Proposition 140 also imposed a limit of two, four-year terms on other statewide elected officials, including the governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, controller, treasurer and superintendent of public instruction.

Some political observers say that although term limits have had a large impact, that is not the only reason so many incumbents are looking to move.

Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, a political analyst at the Center for Politics and Economics at the Claremont Graduate School, said: “Term limits definitely are having an impact, but there are other contributing factors, including the sourness of the current political environment, the voters’ anger with the political system and politicians. This is a very mean-spirited time.”

Moving On

Here is a list of Assembly and Senate incumbents who are seeking other offices or retiring this year:

ASSEMBLY DEMOCRATS

* Rusty Areias of San Jose is running for state controller.

* Jim Costa of Fresno is running for state Senate.

* Delaine Eastin of Fremont is running for state superintendent of public instruction.

* Terry B. Friedman of Encino is running for a Los Angeles Superior Court judgeship.

* Mike Gotch of San Diego is retiring.

* Johan Klehs of San Leandro is running for State Board of Equalization.

* Burt Margolin of Los Angeles is running for state insurance commissioner.

* Gwen Moore of Los Angeles is running for secretary of state.

* Jack O’Connell of Carpinteria is running for state Senate.