Supervisors vote to demote Conroy
for lack of emergency management experience

Annemarie Conroy. File photo (5/18/6)
Photo(s) by Luke Thomas

By Emmett Berg, Bay City News Service

October 3, 2006

SAN FRANCISCO (BCN) - The San Francisco Board of Supervisors completed a renaming of city emergency agencies today that was orchestrated to reduce the authority of a mayoral appointee widely criticized as inexperienced.

Annemarie Conroy, starting tomorrow, will begin a lesser-profile role as the deputy director for emergency services, one full tier below her previous position on the city's command structure, director of emergency services.

Conroy will report to Laura Phillips, hired six months ago to run the city's Office of Emergency Management.

The latest salvo in the power play between supervisors and Mayor Gavin Newsom was accomplished via an 11-0 vote to create a new "Department of Emergency Management" to oversee two related agencies, one overseeing emergency services and the other managing 911 and emergency communications.

Michela Alioto-Pier, appointed by Newsom to represent the Second Supervisorial District, said that 70 percent of San Francisco's first responders live outside the city and may not be able to get here in case of a disaster.

When the Loma Prieta earthquake hit in 1989, the city relied upon fast work by thousands of military personnel stationed at the Presidio and the Alameda Naval Air Weapons Station, Alioto-Pier said. Now those installations are shuttered and the city lacks a seasoned leader, she said.

"Yet we have a three-star general living in San Francisco who served in Iraq," the supervisor said. "We need to tap into these resources."

Conroy has been criticized for attending school in Monterey to learn aspects of homeland security as she keeps her full time job in San Francisco.

Today's board action requires the director of emergency management to have at least 10 years experience in emergency services and five years experience in a management position.

"This position requires someone who can do the job, not because they're a quick study, but because it's a life they have lived," Alioto-Pier told board members.

Conroy did not speak to the board on the issue. The mayor's office was not immediately available to comment on the action.

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