For David Fleming, it’s about connections: connecting people and connecting information, like links in a chain or putting two and two together and maybe, at least once of note, seeing the need to disconnect. From his 25th-floor office at the Cahuenga Pass, Fleming can look over the San Fernando Valley and survey a sea of connections, from the freeway interchange directly beneath him, to the Simi Knolls, across the Valley he wanted disconnected from the City of Los Angeles. Despite the secession movement’s failure, he sees the region as benefiting from the now-greater connection, indeed having clout, and access to clout, as the diamond necklace of reconciliation from that attempted municipal divorce. Although Fleming’s a lawyer, he’s not a divorce lawyer; he specializes in tying, not untying. Others could take lessons from him in uniting, not dividing. Although Fleming’s a lawyer, he’s not a divorce lawyer; he specializes in tying, not untying. Others could take lessons from him in uniting, not dividing. In his case, connections are power. And as a measure of that power, in a non-scientific but non-random way the San Fernando Valley Business Journal surveyed various Valley stakeholders and powerbrokers for their opinion of whom would be the Valley’s Most Powerful Person and the person most mentioned was Fleming. Hands down. Cited for the breadth and depth of his connections to business and community, “threaded into so many elements of the Valley” and “he’s interwoven” were typical descriptions. “Almost any good thing that’s happened recently in the Valley, David Fleming has had a hand in it,” said Ron Kaye, editor of the Los Angeles Daily News. When he learned of that consensus, Fleming sort of muttered “I don’t know about that.” Brendan Huffman, president of the Valley Industry & Commerce Association, said “He’s a giant. He’s been around so long and he’s responsible for so many business organizations and ballot initiatives.” Citing Fleming’s close relationship with mayors Richard Riordan and Antonio Villaraigosa, Fleming has “clearly benefited the Valley,” Huffman said. In a similar survey in a different year, maybe a different person would be named from a long list of the usual suspects. But dubbing Fleming the Valley’s Most Usual Suspect of 2007 doesn’t seem apt somehow, and it’s safe to suspect he might be named in a different year too. Bestowing the mantle of Valley’s Most Powerful Person might be subjective but it is not arbitrary, nor was it measured by office square-footage. His spectacular office view doesn’t translate into a spectacular office. It’s not cramped but it is close-quartered, and counter-intuitively so, for a guy who’s connected to President George W. Bush by his appointment to the James Madison Foundation where he and 11 others (U.S. Senators, Congressmen, federal judges, a governor, a cabinet secretary, some academics and one other private citizen) award scholarships to high school teachers. But it’s clearly a big enough office for a desk that’s that holds the handful of cast-in- resin commendations for the pro bono work he has done, despite the fact he doesn’t do much lawyering. Fleming’s title is Of Counsel for Latham & Watkins, the third largest law firm in the country and world’s fifth largest. The title is usually reserved for retired partners, but he’s had it since he joined the firm in the early ’90s and it frees him to do his community activities. His primary task for Latham is making connections. He said he’s “an interface for the firm, between clients and government.” He’s not a lobbyist. Fleming said Latham has talented people for that. He opens so many doors he likely doesn’t take the time to ponder all the connections one can see from his office’s wall of window. Midway out there, if you know just where to look, sits the stacked plate buildings of Valley Presbyterian Hospital; he’s been chairman of the board of the non-profit for 19 years. Sutured across the landscape one can see a half dozen freeways; he was on the California Transit Commission where he chaired the Public Transit Committee. Roads lace the Valley floor and at the base of his view is the Red Line subway station, both of which he’s connected to as the mayor’s rep on the regional Metropolitan Transit Authority. Fleming is doubly connected there, since the MTA property is pending development by Thomas Properties Group into what will be the West Coast offices and production home for NBC Universal, a Latham client. He’s interconnected. Yet Fleming’s vision extends beyond what he can see. You can’t see the harbor from there, but from his desk Fleming can see the “goods movement” issues and make connections between the shipping centers of L.A./Long Beach and the relevant areas in Louisiana, Chicago, Washington State, New York/New Jersey and Texas. The Port of Los Angeles/Long Beach is the largest in the country, and the issues, Fleming said, are federal. “We’re the loading dock for the country.” A coalition of the geographically-pertinent elected officials, those politicians can help make clear the connections to goods on the shelves and in the homes of constituents of politicians who would come to support “goods movement” causes. His office is too high to hear the sirens on the streets from the L.A. City Fire Department, where he was president for five of his eight years there. He’s proud of the connection he made between firefighters and paramedics. “There aren’t that many structure fires any more, because of building codes and enforcement,” Fleming said. “It’s a medical department now, so every firefighter is trained as a paramedic.” It’s not really possible to make out many businesses from among the buildings that speckle the ground, but he’s connected indirectly to most somehow. Whether it’s serving on the Executive Committee of the Los Angeles Economic Development Corporation or as the chair of VICA or his chair of the Economic Alliance of the San Fernando Valley, he likely has addressed any concerns dwelling among the trees below. If not, then perhaps while with the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce where he’s chair until next year when he takes over the chairmanship of the newly formed Los Angeles County Business Federation until, in 2009, when he will be the co-chair of the Southern California Leadership Council, a group that includes the last three governors. The Business Federation is to a newly created umbrella organization of chambers of commerce and business trade groups, meant to echo the clout wielded by the County Federation of Labor. The group’s goal is communicate with elected officials how the otherwise fractured and too-absorbed-in-their-own-matters-to-petition-politicians business community can be made aware of any particular action by any particular member of government. “We want to be competitive to labor,” Fleming said, stressing that the economy is strongest, and everyone is best served, when “the voices of business and labor are equal” in volume. Some would say his helping to negotiate the Living Wage Agreement with the LAX-area hotels has helped to increase the volume of labor’s voice at the expense of business’ voice. “If you do business with the city you volunteer to abide by the city’s conditions and the living wage is part of those conditions; you accept those conditions,” said Fleming. He expressed dubiousness about the logical extension of declaring that when police services are extended to people who stay at the hotels that equates to “doing business with the city.” The agreement reached, he said, was the act of “drawing a line this far and no farther.” Fleming said, “Look, I hope everyone makes a living wage,” but to make that the law, “What message does that send?” A better balance on wages will result, he said, from the economic surge created from a decrease in the business tax. Whether that’s on the horizon isn’t obvious, but charter reform is, said the man who was catalyst for the last changes. “It’s almost 10 years since we adopted the new city charter, after more than 70 years of working with the old one,” Fleming said. What changes does the Valley’s Most Powerful Man see? Power. “We have to give more power to the mayor. Not so much as New York or Chicago,” he said, but power connected to voters. “The more power you give, the more accountability you get.” Waging accountability was his role as a commissioner on the L.A. Ethics Commission, which he quit after taking up the secession fight in 2002. “He was the brains, energy and a lot of the money behind the secession movement,” Kaye said. Bruce Ackerman, head of the Economic Alliance, said reconnecting to Los Angeles was natural for secession’s biggest backer. “He was able to cross the mountain range without baggage,” Ackerman said. Now, after the failure of secession, the City of Los Angeles is engaged anew with the Valley. Fleming said, “I feel we lost the battle but won the war.” Yet he didn’t linger on the question of whether the current attentiveness is now “better than secession,” saying he is intrigued by what “could have been.” He’s an old hand at making happen what other people imagine. Suitably then, he’s on the Valley Performing Arts Center Executive Committee, a group whose goal is to put a $100 million, 1,600 seat venue on the Callifornia State University, Northridge campus. “It will rival Disney Hall,” Fleming said, and he’s trying to connect AT & T; to the project with multi-million dollar naming rights. The biography Fleming releases doesn’t even include past work with United Way, or Coalition on Donation which connects organ donors with those needing transplants, or the L.A. Urban Education Partnership whose mission is fixing schools to create more effective teaching and learning environments and connecting parents to schools. The bio does mention the Children’s Bureau of Los Angeles and the Children’s Planning Council of Los Angeles County, which he was seminal in creating. The Children’s Planning Council coordinates the funding and manages the accounting of over $5 billion of federal and state money coming into the county. “Before, there was no way of measuring where it was going,” Fleming said. Now that they’re connected, “community leaders are playing a role.” Recognizing community leaders is the function of the Fernando Award Foundation, of which he’s a member, (and of which he was the ’91 honoree.) As the award reaches its 50th year, he was vital in deciding how to mark the anniversary, said Ackerman, who recounted the group’s discussion of a dilemma of making the award special yet not making the annual winner overshadowed nor exaggerated. Ackerman said Fleming suggested not naming a winner and focusing on all the past winners and thereby the award itself. “And everyone agreed, understanding how that makes it a tribute to volunteerism,” Ackerman said. This volunteer also is connected to the Civic Alliance, and CSUN Foundation. He serves on the board of the Advisors to the Dean of UCLA Law School and as the chairman of the California Regional Leadership Foundation, a statewide organization of regional civic entrepreneurs addressing regional problems. How does the mega-volunteer keep from getting spread so thin? “I learn to say no,” Fleming said and he measures the needs of one board, panel or committee against the other, balancing “what’s more important at the time.” That’s a juggling act that seems to work in the eyes of some. “He’s never dropped the ball on me,” Ackerman said, adding that “he’s always come through on the things he said he’d do.” Also Fleming stresses that all those groups aren’t lead by boards of one. It’s not just him, he said. “I get a lot of advice. So by the time I have my oar in the water I know what to do.” One senses that on some issues he gives more advice than he gets. Engaging the L.A. Times Editorial Board and the L.A. Chamber on the issue of decriminalizing drugs through his endorsement of LEAP, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, Fleming’s libertarianism takes stride. “Smoke Screen” is a movie written and produced by his wife of 25 years, Jean. It addresses the medical marijuana issue, which is connected to his wife’s post-polio syndrome and the relief she gets from her prescription (medicating by using drops on her tongue, and eating cookies and brownies, “She doesn’t smoke,” Fleming said). He met the former Miss Illinois when she was a Realtor and he had some houses to sell. Amid a laundry list of statistics about the unintended consequences of the so-called War on Drugs, Fleming makes a parallel: “We cut smoking rates in half without making tobacco illegal. We did that mainly through education.” Having influence means connecting what can appear to be conflicting elements, thereby Fleming matches his anti-prohibition with work with the L.A. Police Department Historical Society board of governors. In the same way that importance isn’t measured in the size of one’s desk, wielding power and influence is demonstrated by choosing not to. The concept of power to Fleming is exemplified by George Washington, “He was the first person in the world to voluntarily give up power,” mystifying the seats of power in Europe, Fleming said. “And that,” Fleming said as he punctuated with his finger the moment on a hypothetical timeline in the air before him “was the most important moment in U.S. history.” Our government became credible and trustworthy because of that act, he said. As a guy who serves government commissions and private foundations, the through line between them all, Fleming said, was “helping people.” Kaye said, by working hard to help people join the middle class, “he’s working hard to make L.A. a better city.” “He sees the big picture at all times,” Ackerman said, describing Fleming’s view as higher than the 25th floor. “He operates at the 50,000-foot level, yet has the solid grounding we should have.” Fleming maintains it’s just connections. In making use of the relationships he created over 40 years, “I’m just like anybody else,” said the man who clearly isn’t.