D.C. Control Board Alice M. Rivlin (AP File Photo) Recent Post Stories • Board eases business rules. • Post survey: Residents oppose permanent control board. • Chairman Brimmer forces out head of D.C. school trustees. • Brimmer won't serve again on control board.

By David A. Vise
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, May 30, 1998; Page A01

President Clinton said yesterday that he will extend Andrew F. Brimmer's chairmanship of the D.C. financial control board through a 90-day transition period until Alice M. Rivlin assumes the role. The announcement came as the city's chief management officer began a housecleaning of the top ranks of government with the dismissal of four key officials.

With the control board's backing, Camille C. Barnett said she ousted four officials whose job performance she deemed unsatisfactory. They were Elliott L. Wheelan Jr., who headed the Department of Personnel; Michael T. Hernon, who supervised technology; Allan S. Noonan, head of the Department of Public Health; and W. David Watts, who ran the Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs.

"Any time there is a change in leadership, the executive team changes," Barnett said of the first major round of dismissals since she took responsibility for day-to-day operation of the city in January.

Barnett said that the city government must improve services dramatically and that talented, reform-minded department heads, whom she hopes to recruit after a national search, are needed to get the job done.

The president said he will appoint Rivlin soon to serve as a member of the control board so she can work with Brimmer during his final three months as chairman. In addition, Clinton said he plans to name Robert P. Watkins III, a partner with the law firm of Williams & Connolly and a former federal prosecutor, to serve a full term on the control board along with Rivlin.

Two current members of the control board, Stephen D. Harlan and Constance B. Newman, have agreed to remain with Brimmer on the panel during the 90-day transition. The initial three-year terms of the three members expire at midnight tomorrow.

Camille C. Barnett speaks to reporters at One Judiciary Square. (Juana Arias/TWP)

The unusual arrangement – with Rivlin coming aboard while Brimmer remains as chairman – emerged after the White House had difficulty recruiting five new members for the control board and getting congressional approval for Rivlin to serve as both the number two official at the Federal Reserve Board and as chairman of the control board.

On Thursday night, White House counsel Charles F.C. Ruff, personnel director Robert J. Nash and federal budget chief Jack Lew met with Brimmer and Harlan at the White House and asked them to stay on the panel for an additional 90 days. Earlier in the day, administration officials made the same request of Newman. Yesterday morning, White House Chief of Staff Erskine B. Bowles spoke by telephone with Sen. Lauch Faircloth (R-N.C.), chairman of the Senate Appropriations subcommittee on the District – who first proposed the notion of a 90-day transition period last week – and the parties agreed to the extension.

In addition to providing for an orderly transition, the arrangement will allow Brimmer to defend the city's $5.2 billion "consensus" budget on Capitol Hill over the next several months. Senior administration officials said it makes sense to have Brimmer, who devised the budget along with Mayor Marion Barry (D) and D.C. Council members, carry out that assignment.

"This is the right way and the best way to provide for an orderly transition," Clinton said. "This transition period will fully provide the incoming board members with continuity that will allow them to meet the challenges of the board's second term, namely maintaining the city's fiscal health and returning decision-making power to the elected officials of the District of Columbia."

Rivlin, a District expert who wrote a landmark study of the city, said she was happy that the president selected her to head the control board. The panel, created amid a fiscal crisis in 1995, is slated to run the District government until the city balances its budget for three more years.

"I am pleased that the president has indicated that he will nominate me to be the next chair of the control board, and look forward to the opportunity to work with Andrew Brimmer, Constance Berry Newman and Stephen Harlan as they continue their good work for the District during a transition period," Rivlin said. "I am delighted with the chance to serve the city as we build the foundation to return decision-making powers to the elected officials of the District."

Clinton praised outgoing control board members Joyce A. Ladner and Edward A. Singletary, saying they had "made an enormous contribution to the District" by aiding the city's financial recovery.

Although Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) and Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va.), chairman of the House Government Oversight subcommittee on the District, praised the new control board appointments and the notion of a transition, other city officials reacted with anger to the ouster of four senior city officials.

Barry questioned whether the control board has the legal authority to remove the heads of technology and personnel and said he was upset that he was not consulted by Brimmer and Barnett before the officials were asked to resign. Barry, who is in Taiwan, said that he received a phone call in the middle of the night from Barnett informing him of the personnel decisions and that he expressed his unhappiness to the chief management officer and to Brimmer.

"It is disrespectful," Barry said in a phone interview. "I told [Barnett] I was outraged at her talking to me after the fact. . . . This violates all of the cooperative, consultative attitudes we have been trying to develop."

Barry also said the White House had let District residents down by failing to recruit and appoint an entirely new set of control board members. "This demonstrates to me that they didn't consider this process very important or a high priority," Barry said. "And the citizens of Washington again are being overlooked and disregarded and sort of made to feel like second-class citizens."

Barry said he appreciated the willingness of Brimmer, Harlan and Newman to remain on the control board for the additional 90 days but urged Clinton to quickly name three people to replace them. By law, the panel must have at least three members to carry out its responsibilities.

The ouster of the city officials came a day after the control board issued hundreds of orders designed to make it easier for businesses to operate in the District. Joslyn Williams, head of the local branch of the AFL-CIO, said the control board's far-reaching edicts and ousters would make it more difficult for Rivlin to win the residents' trust in the months ahead.

"It is bound to leave a negative impact on people's views toward the control board," Williams said. "It justifies the criticism and attacks that critics of the control board have been making that they cannot be trusted."

D.C. Council member Harold Brazil (D-At Large), a candidate for mayor, said the control board's streamlining of the District bureaucracy was long overdue.

"While I applaud the control board's actions," he said, "I disagree with their move to substitute their judgment for that of the council and the mayor."