- Denis C Theriault
- Gail Shibley and Mayor Charlie Hales in May 2013
Now that the rigors of deadline for this week’s paper are past, we can report what you may have already heard: Mayor Charlie Hales’ chief of staff, Gail Shibley, is moving on. The mayor’s office formally announced her upcoming departure this afternoon, after Willamette Week reported she’d accepted a job at the Oregon Youth Authority.
“Gail has done an exemplary job leading my office,” Hales said in a statement. “She never sought the spotlight, wanting the work to speak for itself and her staff to get the credit.”
That’s true. While a city hall fixture, Shibley has kept a relatively low public profile in the last two and a half years. The one big exception came when a former Hales staffer filed a civil rights complaint against her, claiming she’d mocked him for being HIV-positive.
She also grabbed attention in more typical ways too. In 2013, she trekked to Monaco to help Portland bag the World Indoor Track and Field Championships coming to the city next year. The mayor’s office statement credits her for helping hammer out a settlement with the US Department of Justice over police abuses, and helming the budget process.
Shibley was the first staffer Hales announced in late 2012, shortly after winning what had been a hard-fought mayoral election. The choice was seen as risky, given Shibley’s history of being the boss herself (she’s a former state representative). Hales told the Oregonian that was purposeful, saying he’d need a strong “emissary and alternate” to help him wade through the sticky issues like a $20-million-plus budget shortfall.
It wasn’t a random hire, either. Shibley had had city hall ambitions in the past, having lost a 1996 city commissioner’s race to Jim Francesconi. In the run-up to being tapped by Hales, though, she worked for a decade at the Oregon Health Authority. Now she returns to the state once again, though she’ll be in the business of incarcerating juveniles rather than public health policy.
“The offer to join OYA was simply too terrific an opportunity for me to pass up,” Shibley said in a statement, “as I can join an enlightened public safety agency focused on helping our young people lead productive, crime-free lives.”
Speculation on a replacement has been leaning heavily toward Josh Alpert, Hales’ director of strategic initiatives, who ping-pongs around city hall every day, working nearly any issue the mayor’s interested in. Alpert’s reputation in the building is stout enough that the Mercury named him the most underrated city hall staffer last year.
The Oregonian points out that it’s more common for a deputy chief of staff to be tapped when the chief moves on. That’d be Tera Pierce, whom Hales hired last summer.
Here’s the full press release:
PORTLAND, OR – Portland Mayor Charlie Hales’ Chief of Staff is returning to state government. After two and a half years building and leading the mayor’s office, Gail Shibley announced today that she is leaving City Hall to become Assistant Director for Business Services at the Oregon Youth Authority (OYA).
A former City program manager and state legislator, Shibley had been a public health administrator for the Oregon Health Authority for almost ten years when then Mayor-elect Hales named her Chief of Staff in December 2012.
“It has been a professional privilege and personal honor to serve as the Mayor’s Chief of Staff,” Shibley said. “I am proud of the work we have done together, and know I leave at a good time for our office team, City operations and the people of Portland. The offer to join OYA was simply too terrific an opportunity for me to pass up, as I can join an enlightened public safety agency focused on helping our young people lead productive, crime-free lives.”
During her tenure at City Hall, Shibley was personally engaged in several top-level police reform efforts, including police union negotiations and the U.S. Department of Justice’s settlement agreement with the City. Shibley also led the mayor’s budget process, championed its nascent performance management system, spearheaded the effort to secure the 2016 World Indoor Track & Field Championships and was the Mayor’s lead in discussions with Google to provide synchronous broadband residential fiber service.
“Gail has done an exemplary job leading my office. She never sought the spotlight, wanting the work to speak for itself and her staff to get the credit,” Mayor Hales stated. “The team and systems she’s assembled are top-notch and, as a result, the city is well-positioned to achieve even more and better results in the years ahead. I have enormous respect for Gail and great appreciation that she left State service to help our city these past years. I look forward to working with her in her new role.”
Shibley’s successor as Chief of Staff has not been named. Her final date at City Hall will be mid-July.