Member of Harbor Commission Fired

Ted Stein, a lawyer and developer who ran for city attorney in 1997 with the enthusiastic support of Mayor Richard Riordan, on Friday was fired from his Harbor Commission post by the same mayor.

“The mayor has asked Ted Stein to step down,” said Deputy Mayor Manuel Valencia.

Riordan, the mayor’s deputy said, decided to tap real estate developer Rick J. Caruso for the Harbor Commission seat because he believes waterfront development should be a high priority during his final year in office and he considers Caruso the right person to carry out that mission.

Riordan’s office announced the changes Friday afternoon, timing that critics said suggested the administration’s desire to draw minimal attention to it. The announcement did not even mention Stein, but merely announced his replacement.

Stein did not go quietly, saying, “I am utterly disappointed in Dick Riordan, both as an elected public official and as a person I have known for seven years.” Stein said Riordan had proved that “he’s no different from any other politician.”

Although Valencia denied it, several political observers and City Hall officials saw Stein’s replacement as retaliation for his support of City Atty. James K. Hahn in the mayor’s race. Riordan is prevented by term limits from running again, and has endorsed friend and advisor Steve Soboroff to succeed him.

Some of the mayor’s closest associates, however, have broken with Riordan and are backing other candidates, most notably Hahn. The result is a rift within the Riordan camp, once a solid front but increasingly a tattered one.

Lawyer Bill Wardlaw, for years the mayor’s closest friend and by far his most important political advisor, stunned Riordan and his supporters when he joined the Hahn campaign as its chairman.

Since then, a number of Riordan admirers--including Lisa Specht, Leland Wong and Stein, all of whom served as Riordan appointees to city commissions--also have signed on with Hahn. Wong was dropped from the Airport Commission last week.

They are helping to raise money for the city attorney.

With those political currents at work, several Riordan rivals--and even some friends--were quick to accuse the mayor of using his power over commissioners to punish his onetime ally.

“There is no earthly reason for Ted Stein to leave the Harbor Commission other than politics,” said Bill Carrick, a campaign consultant who is working with Hahn in this mayoral race but who also helped manage Riordan’s 1997 reelection. “This is just a big, smelly political thing.”

Wardlaw, who has almost never criticized Riordan for any action as mayor, on Friday broke from that pattern. “The only winner in all this is Jim Hahn, because Ted Stein has doubled his goal for fund-raising,” Wardlaw said. “And the only loser is the city.”

Carrick said that in 1997, Riordan asked Stein to step down from his commission post when he announced his candidacy for city attorney, feeling that it would be a conflict for Stein to hold an appointed city office while seeking an elected one.

In this election, however, Riordan has not made the same demand of Soboroff, who continues to hold a seat on the Recreation and Parks board even as he campaigns for mayor with Riordan’s support.

“What’s the operating principle here?” Carrick asked. “They’re so amateurish.”

Riordan’s power to remove commissioners was enhanced just three weeks ago by the adoption of the new City Charter, which was passed last year with Riordan’s support. The charter allows the mayor to fire any city commissioner, and those commissioners have no way to seek a City Council override of such a decision.

Under the old charter, the mayor was required to seek council approval before firing any commissioner, so a simple council majority could block any removal.