Banker Advised Presidents, Helped Revive Pa. Avenue

Henry A. "Hank" Berliner, 75, a lawyer, banker, presidential adviser and leader of the commission that revived Pennsylvania Avenue between the Capitol and White House in the 1980s, died Sept. 8 at his home in Annapolis. He had pancreatic cancer.

Mr. Berliner was a well-regarded banker for much of his career and was one of the few industry executives to serve as an adviser to the federal agency handling the cleanup of the nation's failed savings and loan institutions in the early 1990s. He had been an early critic of some of the practices of his industry and urged more regulation, an unusual stance for a conservative Republican who had raised significant sums for the GOP.

He had been president for eight years of Annapolis-based Second National Federal Savings Bank, one of the largest savings and loans in Maryland, when it was taken over by federal regulators in late 1992.

Nearly 15 percent of its $1.6 billion in assets were bad -- one of the largest proportions of bad loans in the industry at the time, The Washington Post reported.

The thrift had lent money to high-risk commercial and resort developers during the 1980s boom, and when it ended, Mr. Berliner attributed the bank's failure to "a three-year real estate recession," combined with stricter new thrift and bank capital rules that were about to take effect.

However, the federal Office of Thrift Supervision said Second National's management was to blame for its problems. His daughter, Tina Berliner, said that Mr. Berliner had been asked by federal regulators to take over bad assets from other failed thrifts and that those bad loans weighed heavily on the thrift's balance sheet.

Mr. Berliner, a former federal prosecutor who had been appointed to federal positions by three presidents, bounced back within the year, starting National Mortgage Corp., a mortgage brokerage, in 1993.

Six years later, he joined Baltimore Contractors, a commercial contracting and management firm, as corporate secretary and marketing director. He also worked as an executive for Baltimore Air Balance Co. and Tamiami Air Balancing & Commissioning. In 2005, the governor appointed him to the Maryland Economic Development Corp., and he became its treasurer. At the time of his death, he was special assistant to the Annapolis mayor, assigned to lead several historic preservation projects in the city.

Henry Adler Berliner Jr. was born Feb. 9, 1934, in Washington. Mr. Berliner graduated from Wilson High School in the District and the University of Michigan. He served as an air intelligence officer in the U.S. Navy from 1956 to 1959. He received a law degree from George Washington University in 1964.

His marriage to Bodil Iversen Berliner ended in divorce. Survivors include his wife of 24 years, Margaret Rouse Berliner of Annapolis; three children from his first marriage, Marine "Tina" Berliner of Austin, John Berliner of San Francisco and George Berliner of Aliso Viejo, Calif.; two children from his second marriage, Meghan Berliner and Michael Berliner, both of Annapolis; a sister; and four grandchildren.

Mr. Berliner worked for three years as an assistant U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia and then formed the law firm now known as Berliner, Corcoran & Rowe in 1969. In 1972, he was appointed to the Commission on Judicial Disabilities and Tenure by President Richard M. Nixon, and he was reappointed by President Gerald R. Ford. That board had the power to reappoint, discipline and remove all non-federal judges in the District of Columbia.

Mr. Berliner worked on a transition team for President Ronald Reagan in 1980, and three years later, Reagan made Mr. Berliner the chairman of the Pennsylvania Avenue Development Corp. The street, intended as a grand boulevard, by 1960 had become a series of pawnshops, souvenir stores and boarded-up or unfinished buildings.

Almost 30 years later, the PADC, a $1.8 billion joint public-private venture, financed extensive public improvements along the avenue, acquired sites and held design and development competitions.

"Developers had to be assured we would deliver. We had to give them the promised amenities -- the parks, sidewalks, lighting -- and help them in the approval process," he said in 1989. Residents and local organizations said the PADC drained the area of its local importance and built an antiseptic environment empty of everything but tourists and federal employees. But Mr. Berliner said he thought that Pierre L'Enfant, who designed the capital city more than 200 years ago, would be pleased.

"Much of what he envisioned back in the 1700s, he wouldn't recognize," Mr. Berliner said. "But the concept of a wide vista and ceremonial avenue with lots of fountains, parks and green, open spaces does fulfill his vision, I think, of what a great city should look like."