NCC Land Use General Manager, Eileen Fogarty, Introduced - County Executive Gordon Presser 1PM In New Castle

 (images: County Executive Tom Gordon's meeting with Civic Umbrellas Monday)
 

Civic groups are very much looking forward to working with Thomas Gordon's new DLU GM to reverse setbacks from the Coons-Clark era. Kudos to David Grimaldi for this great new hire!
  

New Castle County Executive selects veteran planner to lead Land Use Department

New Castle County Executive Tom Gordon has selected veteran land use planner and political outsider Eileen Fogarty to head up the Department of Land Use, the core of County Government’s function.

Fogarty, founder and president of The Fogarty Group since July 2011, has accumulated 30 years of experience in urban land use planning, zoning and development review, transportation planning, and economic development. She most recently served as Director of Planning & Community Development for Santa Monica, Calif. from 2006 to 2011.

Prior to Santa Monica, Fogarty served as Director of Planning, Zoning and Development for Alexandria, Va. from 2000 to 2006 and Director of Community Development for Santa Cruz, Calif. from 1996 to 2000.

Gordon had been searching for a land use administrator who could take on the challenges facing New Castle County, where land use planning has been poor for nearly a decade. Fogarty’s resume rose to the top as Gordon and Chief Administrative Officer David Grimaldi examined the 25 applications they received.

“She's really uniquely qualified, Gordon said. “She’s the real deal. We can’t afford not to grab her. She's very qualified to deal with the unique issues we face.”

The fact that Fogarty was an outsider unconnected to anyone in Delaware was also important, Gordon said.

“I don't know anybody that knows her; that’s a good thing,” he said. “Land Use is the reason the County Government was formed and I think we have failed in the last number of years. There have been so many exceptions to the Unified Development Code. She has the ability to dig into the code and bring award winning concepts here.”

Gordon is scheduled to introduce Fogarty at 1 p.m. Wednesday in the Executive Office of the New Castle County Government Center, 87 Reads Way, New Castle, DE 19720.

Grimaldi said Fogarty was hired for her professionalism, knowledge and experience.

“The most important component of county government is hiring talented people,” he said. “She has worked at a few different municipalities where the challenges were the same. “There was public mistrust and the need to bring people back. She's very familiar with the climate we're in now.”

Fogarty, a Queens, N.Y. native, received a Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, from the University of New Hampshire and a Master of Arts from Rutgers University. She has lectured at University of California, Berkeley; University of California, Los Angeles; the American Planning Association and other institutions.

Fogarty said she had been in planning her whole career on both the East and West coasts.

“I’ve been in communities that have really needed investment,” she said. “When I went out to Santa Cruz, California, the city had fallen down from the earthquake. So, that was an issue of rebuilding and getting investment into an entire city.

“I’ve been in Alexandria and Santa Monica, where the issues were citizen distrust of the process and a lot of growth pressures. Also, a lot of the community was left out of all of the process and left out of the prosperity. I’ve had tremendous success in turning agencies around and brining enthusiasm and motivation to the agencies. And you work with the community so that the community feels like the department is representing them.”

Fogarty still has to be confirmed by New Castle County Council. But the County Executive introduced Fogarty to three Council members – Councilwoman Elisa Diller, Councilman Jea Street and Councilman Bob Weiner – and all three of them were very impressed with the top candidate.

 

(News Journal) Adam Taylor reports ~ New manager aims to fix NCCo’s land use system - Eileen Fogarty: "there was a lot of “citizen distrust” of the land use systems in Alexan­dria and Santa Monica. “I’ve had tremendous success in turning agencies around and bringing enthusiasm and mo­tivation to the agencies.”

Fogarty will be charged with revamping the county’s comprehensive plan, which was updated last year under Clark. [David] Grimaldi said Clark’s policies favored developers and the plan needs an overhaul. Fogarty also will examine the county’s controversial workforce housing program, which gives developers den­sity bonuses in exchange for building affordable housing. She will review the redevel­opment program as well, which allows developers to bypass traffic studies and avoid paying expensive im­pact fees in exchange for building on abandoned com­mercial sites instead of farm­land. Workforce housing has been ineffective and redevel­opment has been misused, so developers have gotten ap­provals to build more units on land without benefiting the community, Grimaldi said. “One of the biggest things the county suffers from is poor land use planning,” he said. “There is a conceptual plan but no steps in how we should get there. We want a good, detailed plan.”

County Councilman Bob Weiner said he has been fa­miliar with Fogarty’s work for years because of his membership in the National Association of Counties. He thinks the fact Fogarty is not from Delaware is an asset. “Previous general man­agers have been pressured to allow politics to color their professional decision-mak­ing,” Weiner said. “Eileen Fo­garty’s national perspective will not permit her to be so compromised.” Grimaldi agreed, saying, “She’s going to set the tone, not us.” Weiner said Fogarty isn’t here for the long haul. He said Gordon and Grimaldi told him she will stay for 18 months to two years to try to fix the department for the next general manager. “She’s here to do triage,” Weiner said. “This is a long­term temporary stay.”

Also from Taylor today ~ Greenville debates rezoning for housing development

The Mary Kaye Carpenter Trust wants to rezone part of its Wagoner’s Row property in Greenville to build 12 single-family homes that will sell for about $1 million each..........Ruly Carpenter, the property’s trustee, now wants to subdivide the property. The majority of residents in the nearby Centennial community support the plan, according to homeowners’ as­sociation President Christopher Dono­ho. They’re backing it because the trust has agreed never to build more than 12 homes on the property, to limit the homes’ heights to 35 feet and to build the homes farther back from roads than the code allows, he said.

........Elizabeth Snyder, who lives on Mont­chanin Road (Del. 100), which is part of Delaware’s National Scenic Byway, said the plan would devalue her proper­ty and increase traffic congestion. “People who would want to buy my house would not want to be next to that,” Snyder said. “I don’t think this plan is consistent with the long-term vi­sion for the scenic byway.”

Kennett Pike Association President John Danzeisen told the board his group is staying neutral regarding the project, but said, “Clustered housing, as a general matter, is a good way to preserve open space.”

Montchan Homeowners’ Associa­tion President Stephen Rahaim and res­ident Lois Dow said the rezoning would set a bad precedent for other undevel­oped properties in the area.

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