Mayor-Elect Setti Warren Names New Executive Team
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 18, 2009
Newton, December 18th – Mayor-Elect Setti Warren announced the structure for and some of the appointments to his new executive office.
Robert Rooney, 53, will serve as Chief Operating Officer reporting directly to the Mayor and will have responsibility for all day-to-day functions of City Hall. Rooney previously served the Deval Patrick administration as Deputy Secretary of Transportation for Public Works and the City of Newton as Commissioner of Public Works. A graduate of Syracuse University and MIT, Mr. Rooney holds a BS and SM in Civil Engineering.
Sarah Ecker, 46, will serve as the Director of Community Relations reporting to Bob Rooney and will have responsibility for all outreach from City Hall. In that capacity, Ms. Ecker will oversee community involvement, government relations, press as well as appointments to Boards and Commissions. She will help implement many of the ideas developed by the Community Involvement transition team including regularly scheduled Town Hall Meetings. Ms. Ecker has extensive experience in the public sector having served as a budget and policy advisor to the mayors of San Francisco and New York City. She was appointed to Newton’s Blue Ribbon Commission, served as a citizen member of the Newton North High School Citizens’ Task Force and has lived in Newton since 1997.
Aaron Goldman, 29, a long time resident of Newton, will serve as Citizens’ Assistance Officer. He will not only handle citizens’ complains and inquiries as required in the Charter, he will be responsible for implementing and managing the City’s state of the art 311 system. Such a system, which can operate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, tracks citizen complaints and requests until resolution and can substantially improve both responsiveness and efficiency. Mr. Goldman graduated from University of Massachusetts and most recently served as Deputy Communications Director and Policy Advisor to State Senator Steven Baddour in the State House.
Megan Costello, 23, will serve as Mayor Warren’s Executive Assistant and Scheduler. She has served in that capacity throughout the transition and recently graduated from Suffolk University where she majored in Sociology. Throughout her college years, Megan was active in politics and played a leadership role in student government and STAND: An Anti Genocide Coalition of which she was the Co-Founder.
The Mayor-Elect has begun an extensive search for a Chief Financial Officer and Beth Banks, Director, Human Resources at the Harvard Kennedy School has agreed to donate her services to complete that work. In the interim, Sarah Ecker will oversee financial operations working closely with Department Heads and David Wilkinson, the Comptroller, on the preparation of the FY 2011 budget which is already underway. Mal Salter, who is currently serving as Senior Advisor, has agreed to continue in that unpaid role.
In addition, the Mayor-Elect has asked the Board of Aldermen to release two jobs budgeted but reserved for the implementation of performance management. Setti Warren, Ruth Balser, Ken Parker and Paul Coletti all campaigned on the promise of implementing a performance management system like those currently in place in cities such as Somerville, Baltimore and Atlanta. Mr. Warren looks forward to getting a quick start on the use of such a system by filling both of these jobs in early January.
The New Executive Organization
