Talent agent finds role on Hahn's airport panel.

The Los Angeles Airport Commission, which is due to vote on Mayor James Hahn's redevelopment plan for Los Angeles International Airport over the next few months, might have found a peacemaker.

That's if Walter Zifkin, chief executive emeritus of Hollywood talent firm William Morris Agency Inc., meets expectations.

Zifkin, appointed by Hahn to the commission last month, is known for his ability to assuage the monstrous egos that are found in Hollywood, a skill that could auger well as the commission contends with the bitter divisions over Hahn's $9 billion plan to modernize Los Angeles International Airport.

"He has opinions and sticks to his opinions," said Jerry Katzman, a former agent who worked with Zifkin at William Morris. "That doesn't mean he won't listen to anyone else's point of view. He's very bright and does his homework before entering any kind of negotiation."

The appointment turned some heads in Hollywood. Zifkin, a longtime show business insider, belonged to an agency not known for its extensive political involvement.

"I've never known him to be interested in Los Angeles, ever," said a former William Morris agent who asked not to be named. "He was interested in Beverly Hills when he was in Beverly Hills. He was very close to the mayor and the city council."

Zifkin declined comment, saying he wanted to wait until the City Council approved him as a commissioner, a process expected to be complete in the next few weeks.

Hahn also named David Voss, a Westchester lawyer, and Jerome Stanley, a sports agent, to the board. One of those open positions was created after board President Ted Stein resigned in April tinder the pressure of an ongoing probe into city contracting and fundraising practices.

Zifkin's ties to Hahn go back at least two years, when he and six other talent agents at William Morris gave around $4,000 to LA United, the campaign opposing San Femando Valley secession. He also has contributed $1,000 to Hahn's 2005 re-election campaign.

"They've known each other over the last couple of years," said Deputy Elizabeth Kaltman, who noted that the appointment came after Zifkin applied for the job. "The mayor was extremely pleased that he expressed an interest in lending his time and energy to the city."

Zifkin met recently with his district's councilwoman, Cindy Miscikowski--a typical first step in the approval process. Miscikowski has been critical of Hahn's airport plan - proposing her own scaled-back alternative - and of the mayor's decision to reshuffle the commission just before it votes.

The nomination will go to a City Council committee overseeing the airports before heading to the full council.

In 2001, a federal judge in Manhattan, Shirley Wohl Kram, named Zifkin as her adviser on the issue of whether class-action suits filed by Holocaust survivors against Austrian companies should be dismissed. (Wohl Kram is the mother of Steve Kram, chief operating officer at William Morris.)

In 2000, Austria said it would compensate Nazi-era slave laborers with approximately $400 million in reparations and pay a total of nearly $1 billion in compensation for all Holocaust claims.

In return, Austria demanded that Holocaust survivors drop all the lawsuits they filed in U.S. courts.

Zifkin, who earned his law degree from USC and is a registered attorney with the California State Bar Association, recommended that the lawsuits be dropped.

"I am used to dealing with difficult situations and people who have different points of view," Zifkin told Reuters at the time. "Hopefully, I'll be able to bring this expertise to bear in a very different way."