Finance Director’s Wife Appointed to State Post

Cheryl Peace, the wife of newly appointed state Finance Director Steve Peace, has been named to a $117,818-a-year seat on the Integrated Waste Management Board.

The appointment was made by Senate President Pro Tem John L. Burton (D-San Francisco) and the Senate Rules Committee. She succeeds former Senate leader David Roberti (D-Van Nuys) on the waste board, whose six members are appointees of the governor and Legislature.

Cheryl Peace, a homemaker for the last 20 years and a registered Republican, will fill a consumer slot on the board, which oversees local waste-reduction efforts, finds new markets for recycled products and monitors the environmentally safe disposal of solid wastes.

Her husband, Steve, is a Democrat who retired from the Senate last month after 20 years in the Legislature. Last month, he was appointed by Gov. Gray Davis as finance director, the primary architect of the governor’s budget proposals. He is paid $131,412 a year, one of state government’s highest salaries for a non-elected official.

The Rules Committee said Cheryl Peace has been a bank loan officer, has managed family-owned business property and is a bookkeeper for small businesses.