Speaker Takes Aim at Freshman Lawmaker : Assembly: Doris Allen questions Brooks Firestone’s stand on an environmental bill. But GOP members defend him.

He has become the cause celebre of Republican state lawmakers--and the latest target of the Assembly’s new Republican speaker, Doris Allen.

Brooks Firestone, the freshman assemblyman representing Ventura and Santa Barbara counties, has suddenly found himself on the political hot seat after a week of sniping between the two GOP lawmakers.

Republican legislators rallied around him Monday in response to what they called a “hit piece” from Speaker Allen.

GOP caucus members were “up in arms” after discovering a release that Allen’s office sent out last week questioning Firestone’s commitment to the job, said Assemblyman James E. Rogan, a Glendale Republican.

“They were bouncing off the walls when they saw that,” Rogan said.

In the release, Allen “called upon Assemblyman Bruce (sic) Firestone to explain why he could not take a lead role in the effort to fashion workable environmental legislation.” She also said she was disappointed that Firestone said the legislation was complex and needed more study than she gave him time for.

The remarks follow a growing rift between Firestone and Allen after she targeted him last week with an abrupt committee reassignment that left him in a quandary over an important environmental bill.

The maneuver came as Firestone was mulling over contributing financially to an attempt to recall Allen in her Orange County district.

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A longtime Republican Party activist elected in November, Firestone is a leading opponent to Allen’s speakership, which she won in a Democratic-led coup June 5. Allen, a Republican, emerged as speaker with 39 Democratic votes and only one GOP vote--her own.

“I have made it very clear that I absolutely, totally disagreed with what she was doing,” Firestone says. “It’s nothing personal. But I am absolutely opposed to her speakership.”

Last week, with no advance notice, Allen yanked Firestone from the Assembly Transportation Committee--where he wanted to be--and plunked him down in the Assembly Natural Resources Committee--where he didn’t want to be.

Firestone said the last-minute switch put him at a disadvantage because he had no time to study up for a committee vote on a key environmental law reform bill pushed by Gov. Pete Wilson.

The bill, sought by the business community, would weaken the California Environmental Quality Act, or CEQA, which requires decision-making bodies to consider the environmental consequences of a project before approving it.

Among other things, the bill would exempt various kinds of development, including replacement of oil pipelines, from environmental review.

Some Republican caucus members charge privately that Allen put Firestone on the panel because she knew that pro-environment pressures from his coastal district would prevent him from voting Wilson’s way. It was a means, they contend, of repaying Democrats who wanted to see Wilson’s initiative die.

In addition, GOP Assembly members charge, Allen used the reassignment as a tool to retaliate against Firestone for his opposition to her speakership. Some evidence of this got back to Firestone through the Capitol grapevine.

“Apparently she boasted in front of the governor that she did this to hurt me. It didn’t hurt me,” Firestone said. “My only concern is I was upset because these are tough, complex issues, and I didn’t have time to prepare.

“My being thrust in there at the last minute put me in a really awkward position. I agonized over the legislation. Does CEQA need some reform? Yes. Does it need as much as the bill requires? That’s highly questionable.”

With Firestone’s critical vote on the fence, Wilson’s foot soldiers ended up pulling the bill from the committee’s agenda.

Allen spokesman Mike Pottage said the speaker put Firestone on the committee as a one-day appointment “because the issues that were up--the CEQA amendments--were very important to his coastal community district.”

Of Firestone’s complaints about a lack of notice, Pottage said: “Apparently he didn’t understand the bill and he didn’t understand the issues. . . . The speaker expressed some surprise at that because he represents a district in which oil pipelines and other environmental issues are important.”

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Pottage suggested that Firestone “get up to speed” on the CEQA issue, charging that the assemblyman is too wrapped up in the recall attempt against Allen to focus on legislation.

“Are his priorities with Santa Barbara and Ventura counties--or with the recall?” Pottage asked rhetorically. “Are we going to do the public’s business or are we going to throw sand up here?”

Firestone said the whole episode has left him with a bad taste in his mouth.

Particularly disappointing to him, he said, was getting pulled off the Assembly Transportation Committee, where he had become expert on the issues--aided by his 12 years in the family tire business.

“What we have here is the rule of anarchy,” Firestone said. “It’s not leadership. It’s not intelligent.”