Dena Levitz, The Examiner
2007-04-25 07:00:00.0
Current rank: Not ranked

Montgomery County -

Montgomery County Council members on Tuesday confirmed a former member of the U.S. Attorney’s Office to become county attorney, an office both the new appointee and council members said has an increasing focus on land use and procurement litigation.

Leon Rodriguez, a former New York district attorney and trial attorney with the U.S. Department of Justice, was selected for the job last week by County Executive Ike Leggett. And following a rather mild round of questioning about future challenges and goals, council members seconded that call, effectively hiring him.

Council Members George Leventhal and Duchy Trachtenberg praised Rodriguez’s background in health law during Tuesday’s meeting in Rockville, even as they acknowledged that he had a slight learning curve to overcome regarding real estate litigation, a growing segment of the office.

With a budget just more than $5 million and 42 staff lawyers, the county attorney’s office is charged with representing all county government entities — from the executive to the council and the public school system — against legal pitfalls.

In taking on this task, Rodriguez said he planned to focus on three areas: fighting fraud and abuse against the county, re-engaging a dialogue on the standards as to when the county attorney’s office should intervene on land issues and evaluating whether the internal structure of the office is efficient.

“My role is to think not so much about where the office will be in a year, but where it will be in 10 years,” Rodriguez said.

That includes being more proactive in areas such as outside contracts and ensuring that vendors are sticking to the letter of the law, he said.

Yet as Leventhal stressed in his comments to Rodriguez, the job of county attorney is “not glamorous” and not a newsmaker — and being proactive comes second to the defensive role in ensuring that county workers are protected legally.

Besides a position with the U.S. Attorney’s Office managing a staff of 40 lawyers in Pittsburgh, Rodriguez has concentrated his work on white-collar crime as a partner in the D.C. firm of Ober, Kaler, Grimes and Shriver.

dlevitz@dcexaminer.com