Improvements to leasing policies at the Port of Los Angeles haven’t gone far enough to ensure that port negotiations take place in the open, according to an audit released Thursday by City Controller Laura Chick.

The audit, a follow-up to an initial audit in 2003 that criticized the port for negotiating tenant leases in a secretive process, noted improvements but also admonished the Harbor Commission for failing to finalize a new policy.

In a faxed statement, Harbor Commission President Nicholas Tonsich questioned Chick’s motiviations and suggested the city charter be amended to require the controller have experience or education in finance or accounting.

“How is someone with only degrees in history and social work qualified to be controller of any entity, let alone an entity the size of the city of Los Angeles?” Tonsich wrote. “No corporation in the U.S. would hire someone with her education and background for the position of controller.”

Tonsich added that “only someone as unqualified and politically motivated as Laura Chick could claim that the largest, most profitable port in the U.S., which achieved and maintains the highest bond rating of any port from every major bond rating agency, is being mismanaged.”

Chick’s initial 2003 audit criticized the port for negotiating leases with “unwritten rules, secrecy and relationships,” according to a letter sent by Chick to Mayor James Hahn, City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo and the City Council. Questions about contracting practices at the port and other city departments were a factor in Hahn’s reelection campaign, which he lost to City Councilman Antonio Villaraigosa.

Chick had recommended that the port negotiate leases through published requests for proposals, or RFPs. In her follow-up audit, Chick noted that the port has drafted an improved leasing policy and actually issued its first RFP for a lease. But the draft policy hasn’t been formally approved and includes several exemptions from a “competition selection process,” the audit says.

In his statement, Tonsich pointed out that the final draft policy needs Chick’s approval before being brought to the Board of Harbor Commissioners, which “would be happy to consider the policy at its next meeting.”

Chick spokesman Rob Wilcox did not return a call for comment.

Villaraigosa has indicated he wants to appoint new commissioners of the city’s three proprietary departments: the harbor, airport and water & power.