Insider Chosen as Interim Director of L.A. Ethics Agency : Government: Deputy head is unanimous choice of commissioners. Ousted chief calls successor a ‘superb choice.’

The Los Angeles Ethics Commission on Friday picked its highest-ranking deputy to lead the city’s anti-corruption agency while seeking a permanent replacement for Benjamin Bycel, the founding executive director fired last month.

Deputy Director Rebecca Avila, 34, was the unanimous choice of commissioners during a closed-door session that also included discussion of “anticipated litigation” over Bycel’s abrupt and controversial dismissal on Oct. 20.

Bycel, who held his $103,000-a-year post at the pleasure of the commission and was subject to termination at any time, is not entitled to severance pay, but many of his supporters believe he should receive something. Bycel declined comment, but sources said he has hired an attorney and threatened to sue for defamation of character over allegations that he leaked information to the press and was responsible for a yearlong rift with the agency’s statewide counterpart, the Fair Political Practices Commission.

Ethics Commission President Racquelle de la Rocha, appointed by Mayor Richard Riordan to head the panel last summer, defended its 3-1 vote to fire Bycel but said confidentiality laws and threatened lawsuits prohibited her from disclosing specific reasons.

But De la Rocha, a former FPPC board member, made it clear she believes that the rift with the state agency, as well as disputes with the city attorney and district attorney, hurt the board’s effectiveness.

“My first goal in taking office was to strengthen the Ethics Commission’s enforcement power, weakened as a result of our isolation from participation in joint prosecutions with all other enforcement agencies,” De la Rocha wrote in a letter to The Times.

Meanwhile, Councilman Mike Feuer, who heads the council’s Rules and Elections Committee, has scheduled a committee hearing Wednesday regarding the firing. Feuer has proposed several amendments to strengthen the city’s ethics laws, including a measure to dilute the mayor’s powers to appoint commissioners and another to set criteria for the hiring and firing of the executive director.

On Friday, Feuer also asked the city attorney and the Ethics Commission to report to the council on “possible litigation” arising from Bycel’s dismissal.

The council declined to intervene in the termination itself, with some Bycel supporters and even Bycel himself arguing that to overturn the commission’s action would compromise the agency’s authority. However, any settlement or litigation costs arising from the firing are almost sure to require council action.

In choosing Avila, the commission got an experienced hand who has been with the agency almost since its start-up five years ago. She was associate director for grass-roots lobbying at the national office of Common Cause before joining the city.

De la Rocha said “the commission feels very blessed and lucky” to have someone of Avila’s caliber to step into the job.

“I think it’s a superb choice,” Bycel said.