There’s a lot of egg on the faces of folks who run the city of Charleston Housing Authority (CHA)
— scrambled, boiled, sunny-side up, over-easy, poached and runny. But whether what’s been going on at the agency with the hiring of its new executive director is rotten remains up in the air.
The CHA board of directors recently hired Nathan Simms Jr. to be its new chief executive officer. He started work May 4. Five days later, he met reporters at an introductory press conference where CHA Board Chair Gregory Voigt addressed the “chatter” around Simms’ past.
Seems that Simms was fired in November from a similar position in Norfolk, Va., reportedly by a 6-3 vote, after financial allegations arose about some no-bid contracts. But highly-regulated agencies like housing authorities face annual audits where outside officials make sure lots of Ts are crossed and Is are dotted. And while some wonder about Simms’ way of doing business and whether something serious was going on, others wonder whether he got thrown under the bus in Virginia.
Voigt says the Charleston board has been satisfied with its overall process of vetting Simms and followup answers to questions after allegations surfaced. As of this week, it is still confident that Simms is the right man to lead the housing authority as it tries to renovate old affordable housing and win back the confidence of people who live in it.
“We were satisfied that it was not personal to Nathan Simms,” Voigt said at the May 8 press conference. “That was the conclusion we reached based on what we believed in the internal mechanisms of at least what happened.”
It also helps that the board is talking with third-party law firms to do a deeper dive into what happened in Virginia, including assembling a mound of paperwork related to Simms’ job performance, as a double-check behind the board’s evaluation.
This is a positive development because it should shine the lights of transparency over an important executive hire. We’ve long believed and stressed that moving from secrecy to sunshine is something more boards, commissions and city councils need to do.
For his part, Simms is reportedly moving forward. He’s welcomed the review into allegations that are dogging him. He plans to connect with residents and do the business that needs to be done to move the agency forward.
Voigt added, “We believe in the process that has gotten us to where we are, and we believe in the man that the process led us to. The process involved going beyond headlines, going beyond resumes and inquiring. And we believed that we had made that inquiry sufficient, that we could make our decision.”
So for now, we all need to keep a cautious eye on the city of Charleston Housing Authority and its new executive. But we’ve probably got a three-month waiting game before we find out if Simms can recover and remove a lot of eggs lobbed at the housing authority. Or whether they were rotten and the board needs to start a new search.
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