Legislators Outraged by Appointees

Lawmakers expressed outrage Monday that Gov. Pete Wilson has appointed more than two dozen workers from his failed presidential campaign to state jobs, but they predicted that he would block any efforts to cut the number of appointed positions at his disposal.

“We have the governor cutting help for the elderly, for the blind, for the disabled and others, while money is spent on political staff,” said Senate President Pro Tem Bill Lockyer (D-Hayward). “It just seems to me that’s highly inappropriate.”

Lockyer was reacting to a Times report Sunday that the Republican governor exercised his power of patronage to place 28 campaign workers in state service. Half had left government for the campaign, then returned to state service, where they got pay increases averaging 32% and all but one received a promotion.

Lockyer said that the Democratic-led Senate would continue its attempts to “resist the proliferation of political appointees at the top of the executive branch.” But he noted that in the past, Wilson has protected his appointment powers.

The governor has declined to discuss his appointments, but his staff has defended his hiring of trusted aides as part of his effort to move a sometimes recalcitrant bureaucracy.

Pay increases, said press secretary Sean Walsh, were based solely on merit. Walsh also said that Wilson has slowed the overall growth of state government. “This is a record we are proud of,” he said.

On Monday, state Sen. Mike Thompson (D-St. Helena) said that as the governor’s budget proposals move through the Senate, each position will be scrutinized and unnecessary ones will be cut.

“It’s totally inappropriate to be growing government at this rate when . . . the emphasis of the office has been to reduce government services for people,” said Thompson, who chairs the subcommittee that reviews budgets for health, welfare and labor agencies.

The subcommittee already has carved away at administration requests for new, top-level positions. But such efforts in past years have been frustrated by the governor. Thompson said his subcommittee cut out many high-level jobs, but in private meetings between Wilson and legislative leaders last year, the positions were reinstated.

The Legislature’s efforts to eliminate executive branch jobs that the governor wants are doomed to failure, said state Sen. Quentin Quentin L. Kopp (I-San Francisco), who chairs the subcommittee that reviews the budgets for environmental and resources agencies, the California Department of Transportation and the courts. “I feel sorry for the taxpayer,” he said.

Kopp predicted that Wilson’s extensive use of his appointment power would not help restore the governor’s popularity with the public. “It makes you more cynical, even if you’ve been in elective office for 25 years as I have,” Kopp said.

The Times reported that the governor found patronage jobs in his administration for 28 individuals from his presidential committee payroll after the campaign fizzled in September. The cost to taxpayers is $1.3 million a year, plus benefits, according to state figures.

Among those Wilson appointed to state posts were his campaign treasurer, in-house attorney, speech writer and press secretary.

The governor has broad powers to appoint individuals to posts within his administration. The number of these appointed positions has been growing steadily during Wilson’s tenure in office, despite a continuing budget crisis and a governor-imposed freeze on hiring that has left thousands of jobs unfilled.

As a result of Wilson’s freeze, the number of state employees declined by 1.5% last year. But over the same period, the number of political appointees on the payroll rose by 5%, The Times found, using data provided by the state controller’s office. There were 37 more political appointees on the state payroll in January than there had been the year before, bringing the total to 792.

Ruth Holton of California Common Cause said she worries that expansion of patronage appointments increases the public’s distaste for government and politics.

“‘Here he is saying we need to cut back on state government, but he is using the time-honored patronage system to reward people who helped him on the presidential campaign,” Holton said. “But the taxpayers are going to be footing the bill.”

Holton said the Legislature should limit the number of political appointees in each department. “There need to be criteria for those appointments--job qualifications,” she said.