LOS ANGELES, Calif. — Two weeks after telling the city’s several dozen department heads they need to re-apply for their jobs, Mayor Eric Garcetti summoned Fire Chief Brian Cummings to his office to be his first face-to-face interview.
The fire chief was the first of at least 35 department heads that will be meeting with Garcetti over the next 60 days, said mayoral spokesman Yusef Robb.
Garcetti will be looking at the department heads’ “past performance,” as well as their vision of “where they plan on taking their department,” to ensure “their plans align with ours,” Robb said.
He declined to comment on specific issues discussed during Tuesday’s meeting, but said fast emergency response times should be the top priority for the fire department.
The mayor “has been very clear that he expects city departments to do better, to provide customer service, to be faster in response times,” whether it’s responding to 911 calls or processing permits, Robb said.
Cummings and the other department heads were also asked to submit memos describing how they would make their department more sustainable, stimulate the economy, incorporate technology and establish a customer service culture.
“This process is as much about individual managers as it is about developing a new way to assess our managers and our city departments,” Robb said. “This re-application process is the vehicle through which we will create new performance-based methods that the mayor and the public will be able to use to track how successful our departments are.”
