Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger officially named San Francisco Democrat Carole Migden to a high-paying seat on the state's waste board on Friday.
The job pays $132,178 per year.
The appointment was announced Friday afternoon by the Schwarzenegger administration along with a slew of other, largely unpaid board posts, such as members of the board of directors of the Grand National Rodeo, Horse and Stock Show.
Capitol Alert reported Migden was likely to receive the appointment last week.
Migden, who lost her Senate reelection primary to then-Assemblyman Mark Leno in June, is the third ex-lawmaker to land of the lucrative Integrated Waste Management Board in the last two weeks.
The first was ex-Assemblyman John Laird. Then came former Sen. Sheila Kuehl. All three are Democrats. All three also happened to be members of the LGBT caucus.
Migden is a controversial pick after the series of public missteps that helped lead to her electoral deficit in June.
A couple years back, she pressed the vote button of an Assembly Republican for her own legislation. Earlier this year, she paid a state record $350,000 fine for campaign finance violations. She pleaded no contest to misdemeanor reckless driving after a 30-mile drive in her state-owned SUV ended in a collision.
And in August, Senate officials sent her staff members home after she was heard berating them from the hallway.
Jim Boren of the Fresno Bee editorial board called the Migden pick "the worst appointment of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's political career."
Schwarzenegger's office, in a written statement, said the idea for the appointment was from newly sworn-in Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg.
"Senator Steinberg recommended Senator Migden to serve on the Integrated Waste Management Board because she has held several elected positions throughout local and state government for nearly 20 years and her background will serve well in this new role to promote zero waste in California in partnership with local governments, industry officials and the public," Schwarzenegger spokesman Rachel Cameron e-mailed in a statement.
Migden began her political career as a San Francisco supervisor before rising to become a state Assemblywoman and then Board of Equalization member and then state senator.
There is a long tradition of legislative leaders and governors appointed ex-lawmakers and close acquaintances to the Integrated Waste Management Board.
Photo: Sen. Carole Migden speaks to a crowd of protesters at rally on the north steps of the California State Capitol in Sacramento on Tuesday June 19, 2007. Credit: Sacramento Bee/ Randall Benton
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