Brown Sees Red p.11

By: M.L STEIN

REPORTERS SENSED THAT San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown was in a bad mood recently when he showed up for his biweekly press conference after a testy exchange with the Board of Supervisors.
But they did not know how bad until, during questioning, he told Barbara Taylor of KCBS Radio she was "full of shit," called Phil Matier of the San Francisco Chronicle "stupid," and generally railed at the journalists for asking questions he didn't like.
The seeds for his blowup were sown three floors up in City Hall, where a supervisors' committee challenged a proposed charter amendment drafted by labor unions and endorsed by Brown. It reportedly would give the mayor greater power over bureaucrats, and the unions more leverage in contract talks.
Some supervisors charged Brown with trying to ram the proposal through without sufficient study. In his column, Matier wrote that the mayor went "ballistic with reporters who suggested that either (A) he was trying to pull a fast one for the unions who supported his election or (B) passing what he knew to be a flawed proposal onto the supervisors so that they could take the heat from the unions for killing it."
In interviews, Matier and Taylor shrugged off Brown's outburst which, they said, was nothing new in his dealings with the media since he was elected six months ago.
"That was just Willie being Willie," said Taylor, a former San Francisco Examiner columnist who spent 20 years covering City Hall.
"He has a really bad temper and has flare-ups all the time," Taylor added. "He is very arrogant. But it blows over as fast as it happens. I could meet him in the corridor 15 minutes later and he would be charming and delightful."
"I did not take it personally," said Matier. "My job is to stay cool and detached. This town has a tough press and there is bound to be friction between us and any mayor."
Matier, whose political column is written with Andrew Ross, even praised Brown for being up front with the press in his criticisms.
"He won't go around you to your editor. There's no backdoor pressure. He'll tell you what he thinks right to your face," the columnist noted. "And he won't apologize, but he'll be there when you have questions again."
Still, Matier observed, Brown, who won statewide fame and attention as Speaker of the Assembly and for his elegant wardrobe and expensive lifestyle, is in "bad standing" with the local press.
"The national press tends to love him but here he's been on a roller coaster," Matier added.
Brown also has enjoyed an extended honeymoon with San Francisco, which has an affinity for colorful individuals ? politicians or not.
Brown was not available for an interview, but his press secretary, Kandace Bender, a former Examiner political writer, said, "The mayor has a lot of respect for the press. He knows it has a job to do and that sometimes the press and politicians are at odds. I would say he has a good relationship with the city hall press, including Barbara Taylor. He thinks she's a terrific reporter."
As to Brown's latest tirade, Bender explained: "He was trying to get them [reporters] to see the big picture and they kept hammering on particular points."
Examiner reporter Rachel Gordon, who also covered the news conference, said it is not uncommon for Brown to vilify journalists.
"I find him fun to cover but not easy," she added.
Her boss, Examiner managing editor Sharon Rosenhause, indicated she feels right at home dealing with Brown.
Rosenhause, who was an editor at the New York Daily News when Ed Koch was mayor, recalled that Koch "was extremely colorful with his language and very confrontational" with the press.
Yet, she went on, "tirades" against the media "are not good."
Editorially, the Examiner didn't think so either.
A lead editorial said of Brown's explosion: "This is not the kind of behavior one expects from the mayor of a great city. San Franciscans don't want a boorish buffoon at the helm."