Mike
Heitz was
appointed as administrator of the city’s environmental and water-quality
programs because he has experience. It’s just that it’s not environmental
experience. “Do I have expertise in those areas?” asks the former city Parks
& Recreation Department director. “Point-blank, no.”
Needless to say, environmentalists, including two councilmembers, are incensed
with the man who put him there: City Manager Jesus Garza. When Garza created
the new Drainage Utility Department on January 3, he removed those programs
from the care of Environmental and Conservation Services Director (ECSD) Austan
Librach. Librach, credited with taking the city to the forefront of
conservation issues, had overseen the programs in one form or another for 10
years, and had expressed interest in heading the new department. Instead, Garza
dubbed him the city’s long-term planner, a “demotion” according to one
councilmember. Four weeks later, Librach tendered his resignation papers. The
turn of events has left environmentalists uncertain of the city’s commitment to
conservation efforts, and fearful that Heitz will let developers get away with
murder.
Librach’s resignation “is a painful blow to what we’ve been doing and what we
hoped to do in the future,” says Councilmember Brigid Shea, incredulous that
the future now hinges on the vision of an inexperienced newcomer whose
background is in management and architecture. Shea says that Heitz “is not the
right person for the job. It’s no malice towards Mike, but we just need someone
with environmental credentials. Mike is the kind of guy who will have more of
an emphasis on economic development instead of water quality.”
But the city manager says that the drainage utility, with its duties
previously divided between two territorial departments — ECSD and Public Works
& Transportation (PWTD), has engineers familiar with environmental codes
and procedures and needed a neutral figure to unite its disparate divisions.
A city audit performed last July bears him out. It cited the drainage utility
for bungled operations, and blamed the organizational structure. The
water-quality and environmental regulatory programs were under ECSD. The other
aspects of the utility — flooding and erosion control — were carried out by
PWTD. Though the divisions had one funding source — a fee assessed on utility
bills — tracking expenses and projects proved difficult. The lack of
coordination and the occasional power struggle left dedicated funding 35% below
requirements, and water-quality and stormwater detention ponds were often
poorly maintained. This, despite an undedicated utility reserve of $17.2
million. Bungling and in-fighting between the departments are to blame.
“The utility was being pulled in two different directions,” said Garza in a
phone interview last week. “That’s not the fault of Austan and that’s not the
fault of [Matt Kite, Public Works director], but we felt we needed a fresh
perspective on how it’s run. We chose to go with somebody neutral because
Public Works and ECSD have certain biases. They haven’t necessarily been at
odds, but they’ve had difficulty in terms of their relationship. Mike [Heitz]
is the one who can bring all those elements together.”
Still working out of his Parks office two weeks after the appointment, but
with portraits and plaques stuffed into boxes, Heitz seems eager for the
change. Though he still hasn’t learned such basic information as the number of
employees he oversees (157), or the size of the utility’s budget — he thinks
it’s “approximately $20 million” (it’s actually $14 million) — the clean-cut,
Richie Rich-lookalike has a crispness and infectious confidence that lends
credence even to his errors. So when he proclaimed that inexperience won’t
hinder his performance, it was almost believable. “The problem is not
expertise. The problem is management. We have the engineering staff in place.
And what I don’t know, I’ll learn.”
Renowned among
the bureaucratic elite as the consummate manager, Heitz quickly became the
city’s fix-it man after arriving from the Kentucky school of governance in
1985. Since then he’s headed up five different departments, getting a
relocation slip every time another department falters. In 1989, he consolidated
the Planning and Development Department from five dispersed divisions.
And in that same year, when the drive to bring the Dallas Cowboys training
camp to town seemed destined for failure, then-City Manager Camille Barnett put
the project in Heitz’s hands. Using his diverse city experience — he was
already a three-department veteran — Heitz brought together the right people
from numerous departments to build a field according to NFL standards, on time
and on budget. “I know how the processes work in all the city departments,” he
says with an edge-of-the-seat aggressiveness. “As far as being able to move
forward within the system and bring things together, I have the expertise to do
that.”
As for criticism, Heitz has heard it before. Parks Department observers
decried his appointment as Parks director in 1992 — he was a business type who
would ignore basic services. Heitz, sporting a stiff, monogrammed button-down
and manicured hands, does seems more appropiate for the boardroom than the
outdoors.
But even his most vocal critics concede that he excelled at the position. He’s
completed more than $8 million worth of capital projects approved by voters in
1992. Those that remain are on their original schedule. And though the Parks
budget is still a shoestring operation, acreage, full-time employment, and most
importantly, maintenance, steadily increased under Heitz’s purview. “The record
speaks for itself,” he boasts.
While no one denies his managerial prowess, many question his intentions. “He
knows how to work the system and push things through,” says Doug Johnston,
Shea’s appointment to the Parks Board until last year, when she wouldn’t
re-enlist him for impolitic behavior. “But he’s a shrewd politician and things
happened the way Mike Heitz wanted them to happen, not necessarily the way park
users wanted them to happen.”
Perhaps the most glaring example is Heitz’s curiously fervent support of the
recent minor league baseball stadium proposal. (The voters disagreed and
rejected $10 million in bonds last October.) It solidified Hietz’s
“wheeler-dealer” persona, and was interpreted by many as proof of a
pro-development mentality.
Heitz says his support was warranted because, prior to the public vote, the
council had approved (6-0 with Shea out of town) the $10 million in
certificates of obligation. “When council says this is the policy, then it’s my
role to implement it,” Heitz argues, and adds that he didn’t advocate the
baseball stadium after a public vote was set (following public pressure), but
proffered only the facts to interested parties, always with a supporter and
detractor present. But in what amounted to an indisputable sales pitch, Heitz
presented his case to editors of The Austin Chronicle a few weeks
before election day, bringing with him the team’s general manager, Craig
Pletenik, and one of the baseball team’s biggest promoters, musician Ray
Benson. Some of the Chronicle‘s own columnists were the only detractors
present.
Heitz’s thirst for the deal is exactly what worries the Save Barton Creek Association (SBCA) members, who
think he may snub the recommendations of the Drainage Utility’s environmental
code section, a 29-member city staff team which reviews development proposals
for adherence to city regulations. SBCA members say Heitz isn’t always
receptive to those around him. They point to an incident as recent as December,
when the then-Parks Director agreed to exempt a parkland dedication requirement
for a 333-acre development in Northwest Austin. (For more information on this
development, see “Naked City”this issue.) Heitz eagerly approved the
exemption because the developer would set aside an 86-acre private preserve in
lieu of the five-acre dedication. But had he sought the advice of the Parks
Board, he would have learned that the code didn’t permit exemptions. Heitz
discovered his own mistake later and the developer dropped the request.
“In the past, we’ve always been able to depend on Austan for a strict
interpretation of the ordinance,” says former SBCA president and current group
member, George Cofer. “He enforced the code from the standpoint of what
produces the best water quality. We have nothing against Mike, but we don’t
know where he’ll be on these issues.”
Heitz responds simply that he’s a creature of the law and the council, and
plans to carry out the will of both to a T. “The code is the code. I want the
code followed. I want the code implemented. I have no intentions to diminish
that.”
And Parks managers who worked under Heitz say he regularly gave way to their
recommendations and knowledge. According to Ray Lopez, Programs Division
Manager, Heitz fostered a Total Quality Management program that solicited the
input of all Park staff. “He wanted staff at the lowest level to receive as
much empowerment as possible. He’d say, `You let me know what training needs
there are and I’ll do it.'”
Perhaps because of the
criticism, or his own inexperience, Heitz is taking extra steps to solicit the
advice of his critics and the employees of the new Drainage Utility Department.
He’s even ordered an employee contest for a new department name, to avoid the
unfortunate acronym, DUD. And though he still has few concrete ideas — his
objective chart is simply the recommendations made by the auditors, and he says
simply, “I’m going to restructure the utility, give it focus, put together a
master plan, and implement that” — he’s already using his diverse experience
to set the DUD on a course agreeable to his critics.
To the delight of the SBCA members, he initiated a meeting at the Hickory
Street Bar & Grill two and a half weeks ago, where he announced some
specific objectives for the utility. Among his more solid ideas, members say,
is the consolidation of resources from Parks and DUD. Heitz wants to see
water-quality and stormwater detention ponds made of grass, instead of
concrete. Since the ponds are usually empty, he says it would permit additional
urban greenspace as well as easier maintenance, since obstructive concrete
walls won’t surround the ponds. “I want to soften their appearance,” he says.
“I want the most amount of greenspace as possible and I want them
landscaped.”
While SBCA members like what they hear, they also know the bigger challenges
are forthcoming. The utility is perhaps the city’s most politically
controversial department. Indeed, Councilmember Ronney Reynolds threatened an
initiative to kill it after the audit was released. He’s been a thorn in its
side since the utility began providing funding (a total of $1.2 million) to
defend the Save Our Springs lawsuit. Reynolds’ threat never materialized, but
he seized the opportunity created by the audit to win council approval last
September to cut $2.2 million from the utility’s annual income.
With the funding cut and the transfer of the recycling program two years ago
from Librach to Solid Waste Services, Cofer says the recent snub of Librach is
just “one more step in a trend of dismantling the environmental department.”
Things may get worse in
terms of finances for the utility. If a development majority sweeps onto the
council this summer, getting the necessary funding in the resultant political
maelstrom will take all the managerial, and political, experience Heitz can
muster. Reynolds’ threat would likely be revisited, and Heitz could come under
heavy pressure to shelve new initiatives. While he’s expected to solve the
department’s financial and operational quandaries, the depth of the transitory
manager’s devotion to the utility and environmental issues remains to be
seen.
That in itself is a setback for the environmentalist camp. They were counting
on the continuation and betterment of programs implemented by Librach, who will
resign from the city on February 16 to join the environmental consulting firm
of Espey, Huston, & Associates, Inc. Although he was often criticized by
hard-line environmentalists, many say Librach put his heart and soul into
conservation issues. He brought various environmental initiatives into the
ECSD, like the energy conservation program and the aforementioned solid-waste
recycling program. Under his leadership, the ECSD drafted numerous
water-quality initiatives, and won a plethora of environmental awards. Austin,
for instance, was the only North American city to garner an environmental award
at a U.N. Earth conference in Rio De Janeiro.
Moreover, those close to the situation say that Librach’s resignation may be
just the beginning. Councilmember Jackie Goodman says the symbolism of the city
manager’s decision may deplete the ranks of the utility further. Indeed, a week
before Librach’s resignation, a top-level utility employee divined that, “Over
the next six months, the sentiment of the employees will be evident in the
turnover. People are concerned about what it means for the direction of the
utility.”
As Shea says, “It’s a sad situation. Because of this bad decision, we’re going
to lose some good people. And as a result our environmental goals could be
jeopardized.”
This article appears in February 9 • 1996 and February 9 • 1996 (Cover).