New Sheriff in Town

The unexpected transformation of the former West Side Senator

By Andrew J. Hawkins

Late last March, as legislative leaders were scrambling to put the finishing touches on the first on-time budget in years, Attorney General Eric Schneiderman was in his 25th-floor office in lower Manhattan having a discussion about an unsung hero of the civil rights movement, Charles Hamilton Houston.

“Have you read this? he asked, holding a copy of the Houston biography Groundwork by Genna Rae McNeil.

Schneiderman"s interest in Houston"s life seems odd. Houston was an African-American lawyer and scholar whose impact on the civil rights movement was not fully appreciated until after his death. Schneiderman is a former state senator from the Upper West Side with a reputation for grabbing the spotlight on liberal issues and irking colleagues on both sides of the aisle. As state senator, Schneiderman wrote a much-need ethics reform bill, led the fight to end the harsh Rockefeller Drug laws, and convened a bipartisan panel to expel his colleague and fellow Democrat Hiram Monserrate after Monserrate was convicted of misdemeanor assault against his girlfriend.

But Houston"s life exemplifies the challenge before Schneiderman: how to bring the attorney general"s office out from the shadow of his powerhouse predecessors's Eliot Spitzer and Andrew Cuomo's and make it his own.

It hasn"t been easy. Early reviews of Schneiderman"s first 100 days in office can be summed up in two words: unusually quiet. Gone is the brash senator who irked the Albany establishment with his liberal, partisan zeal, replaced by a methodical, consensus-building statewide official who is slowly building his name recognition beyond his Manhattan base.

Schneiderman"s low profile is not entirely his own fault. While all eyes were on Cuomo and the budget fireworks, Schneiderman has been building a strategy around three issues: taxpayer protection, mortgage fraud and, the granddaddy of them all, public corruption.

“It"s even better than I anticipated, he said of his first 100 days in office. “This is as perfect a job as I can imagine.

On the morning of Nov. 19, a few weeks after the general election, the Partnership for New York City had a surprise visitor at its annual membership meeting.

Schneiderman, fresh off his hard-fought race against Staten Island District Attorney Dan Donovan, popped in to introduce himself to the assembled titans of business and finance, many of whom had not supported his campaign. Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein, who co-chaired the meeting with News Corp CEO Rupert Murdoch, introduced Schneiderman, who proceeded to describe his background and his plan to recruit top-flight lawyers for the AG"s office. And to set any worried minds at ease, Schneiderman made it clear that when it came to investigating Wall Street, he did not intend to pursue punitive measures, but rather preventative ones that would hopefully root out the bad actors and help the financial sector restore its tarnished image.

“It came as a pleasant surprise to our board, said Kathy Wylde, president and CEO of the Partnership. “I think he bends over backwards to ensure the business community, for the good actors, that they have nothing to worry about.

The Partnership wasn"t the only out-of-the-box visit Schneiderman made. He also met with Archbishop Timothy Dolan, who, as a strong opponent to same-sex marriage and abortion, is not exactly of like minds with Schneiderman.

These stops were not by accident. Schneiderman"s staff realized there was a need to transform the liberal Upper West Side senator into a more inclusive, statewide figure.

In the Senate, Schneiderman was known for being an egghead, a Harvard grad with an eye for strategy, but one who could be brash and combative when the occasion arose. As chair of the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee in the early part of the decade, he fought a bare-knuckled battle to win control of the chamber from the Republicans. His failure made him a target of one of the more brazen gerrymandering attempts in recent years.

During last year"s primary, he had his fair share of gaffes, including a promise to give Rev. Al Sharpton"s House of Justice an “annex in Albany. Cuomo supporters confided to Post columnist Fred Dicker that they were concerned that Schneiderman"s blue streak could derail the incoming governor"s efforts to reform Albany"s lax ethics laws. They feared that in four years, the political establishment and special interest groups, enraged by Cuomo"s push to slash spending, would press Schneiderman to take a run at Cuomo from the left.

And his problems did not end with the election. A little over a month after taking office, Schneiderman was forced to recuse himself from an investigation into alleged financial wrongdoing by Kelli Conlin, the former head of NARAL, who was a prominent booster of his during the election.

Now, with the campaign over, the strategy is to turn attention away from the mudslinging and toward building accomplishments as AG, his aides say. That"s why he picked taxpayer protection, mortgage fraud and public corruption as his top priorities.

One of his first steps was to create a Taxpayer Protection Unit within his office, designed to target tax dodgers, corrupt contractors and “pension con-artists, while bolstering the powers of his office"s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit.

“People are in no mood to hear that their taxpayer dollars are being wasted or that there are contracts where people are ripping off state and local government, he said.

His second step was to push back against the Obama administration"s effort to strike a deal with the banks on mortgage fraud. At meetings in Washington, D.C., Schneiderman raised concerns about the bank settlement being devised by state attorneys general relating to improper loan-servicing and foreclosure practices, arguing against a deal that would preclude his office from pursuing claims against the banks related to their mortgage practices.

If anything, Schneiderman says, his time in Albany gave him a better understanding of the roots of public corruption.

“It is a tremendous help to understand how the system works, he said. “And I think it"s clear I have not hesitated to go after crime and corruption wherever it occurs.

Specifically, Schneiderman says he is directing the charities bureau of his office, which has jurisdiction over nonprofits and, some say, languished under Cuomo, to be more aggressive in ferreting out abuses. To that end, his office was recently reported to be targeting several nonprofits that receive funding from Sen. Shirley Huntley, a Queens Democrat.

Huntley is the first public official to be targeted, but sources close to the office say that she most certainly will not be the last.

In his first 100 days as AG, Eliot Spitzer delved into controversial subjects like “stop-and-frisk allegations, legal protections for gay state workers and accusations of wrongdoing in the Internet trading industry. Four years later, Andrew Cuomo kicked off his term as AG by suing Exxon Mobil, launching Project Sunlight and putting his foot down on legislative member items.

Schneiderman"s introduction has been decidedly more modest. He filed a petition with the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission over fire-safety regulations at Indian Point. He announced his intent to look into's not investigate's the forthcoming merger of AT&T and T-Mobile. And he has gotten involved in a lot of small-bore consumer protection items, like recovering membership fees from shuttered Curves fitness centers, indicting a shady plastic surgeon who allegedly left several female patients disfigured and suing a Troy-based wedding photographer for scamming happy couples.

Schneiderman"s under-the-radar start might be a result of Cuomo"s vacuum-like ability to suck up all the good press and media attention. Another might be the natural tension that exists between their respective offices. Some say that Cuomo is the type of governor that probably wants to be attorney general in addition to his current job.

Even though both are Democrats, Cuomo and Schneiderman have not gotten off on the best foot. Cuomo was said to favor Nassau District Attorney Kathleen Rice for the spot, but eventually endorsed Schneiderman after a squeaker of a primary. After the election, Cuomo attempted to slip into the budget a provision that would have co-opted some of Schneiderman"s power to investigate the financial-services industry. And even though that provision was ultimately removed, Schneiderman"s backers give him credit for not taking the bait.

“He"s played it just right in terms of not stepping on the toes of the governor, making sure they"re playing on the same team, said one source close to both Schneiderman and Cuomo.

James Tierney, director of the National State Attorneys General Program at Columbia Law School, said tension between the offices of the governor and attorney general is commonplace, and in New York practically written into the constitution.

“Every governor wants to be attorney general, especially the ones who used to be attorney general, Tierney said. “It"s just the way it is.

Schneiderman says he is confident that when and if the time comes, the governor will do what"s right's on redistricting, on public corruption or any other issue that may come between their respective offices.

“We"ve known each other a long time, we"ve done good work together already and I think we"re going to collaborate on a lot of reforms, Schneiderman said.

With budget season now over, expect Schneiderman to make a grab for the spotlight more often's on mortgage fraud, on investigations into his former colleagues and on other issues. After all, you can take Eric Schneiderman out of the State Senate, but you cannot take the state senator out of Schneiderman.

“I understand the private sector; I understand the securities industry. You can be progressive on issues like choice and marriage equality and still understand economic policy, he said, a grin spreading across his face. “Being progressive and being smart and well-informed can all go together.