Villaraigosa to Give Up Speaker Post Next Spring

State Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa on Tuesday announced he will step aside next spring and back his friend and fellow Democrat Bob Hertzberg to succeed him as the lower house’s second successive leader from the Los Angeles area.

Villaraigosa, a former union organizer who has been speaker for nearly two years, displayed some wistfulness about giving up the high-profile post to focus on his bid to win election as mayor of Los Angeles in 2001.

Being speaker is “the greatest job in the world,” he said. “Who wants to give up a job where you can call anybody in America and get a call back?”

But Villaraigosa said forcefully that he wanted to avoid a nasty speakership fight and ensure a smooth transition for Hertzberg, whose energy and skill the speaker touted throughout much of a morning news conference in the Capitol.

To ensure Hertzberg’s success, Villaraigosa said he took the unusual step of transferring $1 million from his campaign funds to the prospective successor, and if his longtime ally assumes the top job, he will divert an additional $500,000 for Democratic campaigns. That leaves Villaraigosa with $1 million to funnel to other Democrats, which he has promised to do.

With Villaraigosa’s active support, Hertzberg appears to have all but locked up the backing of most of the Assembly’s 47 Democrats. But Assemblyman Tony Cardenas (D-Sylmar) said he remains an active candidate for the speakership too.

“What I saw in today’s announcement is a deal between two members. . . . There are 78 other members in the house,” said Cardenas.

Although Cardenas said he would welcome support from the Assembly’s 32 Republicans, the leader of that group, Scott Baugh of Huntington Beach, predicted that Hertzberg will be the next speaker.

Although term limits have diminished the job of speaker, once viewed as the second most powerful post in state government, the Assembly leader can set a policy agenda and use the position as a launching pad for higher office. Villaraigosa is a passionate liberal who has focused on the ability of government to help the disadvantaged and on issues of special importance to Los Angeles, including education and the environment.

Longtime political insider Hertzberg, who was elected to the Assembly in 1996 and is Villaraigosa’s roommate in Sacramento, has cultivated a more moderate, business-oriented style that Gov. Gray Davis may find valuable as he advances his own middle-of-the-road agenda.

Villaraigosa is barred by term limits from seeking reelection to the Assembly. Saying his colleagues want an orderly transition, he scheduled an Assembly election on Jan. 24, with the actual turnover of power to occur April 26.

Villaraigosa, who will remain in the Assembly for another year, hopes the long transition will give Hertzberg time to assemble a leadership team and prepare for the March 7 primary election.

“We figure it would give him some time to focus on those things while I focus on the legislative business of the house,” Villaraigosa told reporters.

With Hertzberg’s strong support, Villaraigosa assumed the job in early 1996 from Cruz Bustamante, who is now lieutenant governor.

For months, speculation about Villaraigosa’s plans has swirled around the Capitol as he prepared to run for mayor. At the same time, Hertzberg emerged as his heir apparent.

Villaraigosa said he reached his decision at his home in Los Angeles last weekend, after consulting with many advisors, including Hertzberg.

“The one thing that crystallized is how important it is to leave when you are strong . . . to avoid the speakership fights of the old years. For me, I wanted to leave while I was on top,” Villaraigosa said in an interview.

Asked at the news conference why he wasn’t backing a Latino to succeed him, Villaraigosa said: “I wasn’t elected as a Latino speaker. I was elected as a speaker for everyone. Bob has the vast majority of support of the caucus, many Latinos if not all of them.”

Hertzberg, speaking from a car phone en route to the Capitol from the funeral of a colleague’s father, acknowledged that term limits reduces the ability of a speaker to amass vast personal power, as legendary Democratic speakers Jesse Unruh or Willie Brown did. But he noted that the Assembly is a powerful institution that influences the lives of Californians.

“The prospect of being the next speaker is an incredible honor,” said Hertzberg, who is known for his high energy and for often wrapping colleagues in bear hugs.

One thing Hertzberg said he plans to do is move the regional speaker’s office from downtown Los Angeles, where it is now based, to the San Fernando Valley. Hertzberg would be the first speaker from the Valley since Bob Moretti, who represented the same Van Nuys-centered district.

Hertzberg is an attorney who labored behind the scenes in politics, especially in East Los Angeles and South-Central. Richard Katz, a former Democratic assemblyman from the Valley, praised Hertzberg’s skill and said he had recently joked with Hertzberg’s wife “that Bob has probably been planning for this since he was 9 years old.”

Senate Democratic Leader John Burton of San Francisco said he expects he’ll get along with Hertzberg, but the veteran politician said he’s “got to get over my phobia about being hugged a lot.”

Times staff writer Miguel Bustillo contributed to this story.