Subpoena escalates rivalry

Los Angeles Controller Laura Chick on Thursday subpoenaed records from City Atty. Rocky Delgadillo’s workers’ compensation division, the latest salvo in an escalating power struggle between two citywide elected officials.

Chick said she acted after Delgadillo refused to allow her office to conduct a performance audit on his workers’ compensation program, which oversaw $128 million in payouts in the last budget year, a 9% increase from the previous year, and spends millions more each year on hiring outside attorneys and office costs.

“The people of Los Angeles have the right to know how their government spends their hard-earned tax dollars,” Chick told reporters at a morning news conference, adding that the purpose was to determine if the program is run efficiently and effectively.

After Chick’s comments, a spokesman for Delgadillo disputed her authority, contending that the Los Angeles City Charter does not give the controller the power to “conduct performance audits of other elected offices” or subpoena the city attorney.

“Having said that, we have had the opportunity to review the request . . . and it appears to be the type of public information we would happily provide to any requesting party,” said Nick Velasquez, the city attorney’s director of communications. “So, of course, we’re happy to provide the controller’s office with this information.”

At issue is a provision of the charter, the city’s governing document, that states that the controller shall “conduct performance audits of all departments and may conduct performance audits of city programs, including suggesting plans for the improvement and management of the revenues and expenditures of the city.”

Delgadillo argues that the charter does not specifically give the controller authority to audit “elected offices.”

In March, the city attorney’s office asked Erwin Chemerinsky -- dean of UC Irvine’s new law school and chairman of the elected Los Angeles Charter Reform Commission in the late 1990s -- to provide his legal opinion on a very similar matter involving a proposed performance audit of anti-gang programs in the mayor’s office.

Chemerinsky said the controller had the legal authority to do so in that case and on Thursday said Chick also had the authority to conduct a performance audit on the city attorney’s workers’ compensation program.

“I guess I didn’t say what they wanted to hear,” Chemerinsky said of the city attorney’s office. “She can audit a program in any department.”Los Angeles attorney George Kieffer, who was chairman of the appointed Charter Reform Commission during the late ‘90s, said the intent of the new charter was to exempt the offices of the mayor and city attorney. The question is whether the controller has the authority to audit programs under their control.

“My view: The better reading of the charter is that the controller does not have the authority to audit programs that are in the mayor’s office or the city attorney’s office,” Kieffer said. “However, I think there is some ambiguity and this ultimately may have to be decided by a court.”

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phil.willon@latimes.com