Opinion: Don't short-circuit the job search

No news was good news at the State Board of Administration, which is why few Floridians had ever heard of it before one of its investment advisers lost more than $300-million of the state's pension money by purchasing Enron stock on the way down. Though the $100-billion fund remains sound, the incident raises unavoidable questions about the oversight the staff was giving to Alliance Capital Management (which Florida fired over the Enron losses and is suing) and other commercial asset managers.

Those questions should figure in the search for a successor to Tom Herndon, the board's executive director, who is retiring after 32 distinguished years in state government. As it looks today, however, the search may not reach beyond Coleman Stipanovich, Herndon's deputy.

Gov. Jeb Bush, Comptroller Bob Milligan and Treasurer Tom Gallagher, who make up the Board of Administration, said Tuesday they will spend the ensuing two weeks thinking about whether they should simply promote Stipanovich and forgo a nationwide search. They should scrap that notion now.

Though Stipanovich came to state government from the brokerage business, his experience in managing a portfolio as huge as Florida's is limited to his two years as Herndon's deputy. Are there more experienced people who would apply if invited? Might some of them offer fresh insight on how to avoid another Enron? If in the end Stipanovich still came out the victor, he, the board members and the 16-million Floridians they serve could relish the confidence that the best candidate had won not by default but by competition.

Moreover, a failure to search would put another arrow in the quiver of Bush's Democratic opponents, who are already insinuating that Stipanovich's inside track owes to the influence of his brother, Tallahassee lobbyist and Republican political strategist J.M. "Mac" Stipanovich. The latter's resume includes a major staff role in the 1994 governor's race that Bush narrowly lost.

The governor tried to pass that off with a wisecrack the other day, saying, "I don't think that Coleman Stipanovich should be penalized for the sins of a brother." That raises the question of whether Stipanovich would be profiting from the political influence of a brother. Bush shouldn't make light of what less fortunate people might consider a serious issue.

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