"Sheila Hill-Christian is coming back to Richmond to fill the city's highest administrative position and solve one of Mayor L. Douglas Wilder's biggest political problems.

Hill-Christian will leave her high-profile job as executive director of the Virginia Lottery to serve as chief administrative officer to Wilder, whose administration has been hamstrung by a seven-month political battle over filling the vacant position.

The surprise announcement yesterday ended the disputed reign of Harry E. Black, who was named acting chief administrative officer by Wilder in March and then deputized to do the job after the City Council twice rejected his nomination.

"The acting capacity of Mr. Black was such that the confirmation may have been continued indefinitely," Wilder said. "City government can't act in a vacuum like that."

Black remains the city's chief financial officer and finance director but will relinquish his additional administrative duties to Hill-Christian in 30 days, pending her confirmation by the council.

"I support the decision," Black said yesterday. "I believe it's the right decision."

The announcement paid immediate political dividends for Wilder, who appeared with four members of the council to announce the nomination. One of them, 3rd District Councilman Chris A. Hilbert, had become one of Black's most vocal critics and had called more than once for his replacement after the council refused to confirm him.

"I can't imagine a scenario where I would not support this nomination," Hilbert said. "I would like to see it proceed forward as expeditiously as possible."

Council President William J. Pantele was not present at the announcement, but he welcomed Wilder's choice of Hill-Christian as a positive move for a city government that he described as increasingly dysfunctional since William E. Harrell resigned as chief administrative officer in mid-March.

"I would expect her confirmation should move along smoothly," Pantele said in an interview. "She has the kind of expertise and diversity of experience that we need."

Ironically, Hill-Christian gained some of her administrative experience as chief of staff and assistant to City Manager Calvin D. Jamison, whose administration Wilder had described as "a cesspool of corruption and inefficiency" when Wilder was running in 2004 to become the city's first popularly elected mayor in almost 50 years.

Her résumé includes service as executive director of the Richmond Redevelopment and Housing Authority and chief operating officer of GRTC Transit System. She has led two city departments, Juvenile Justice Services and Parks, Recreation and Community Facilities, as well as holding the top job in the state Department of Juvenile Justice.

"All roads have led to this," she said yesterday. "To have the opportunity to work with Mayor Wilder was simply an offer I could not refuse."

Hill-Christian never actually applied for the job, although 11 others did.

"Her name was advanced and suggested," Wilder said.

Gov. Timothy M. Kaine, a former mayor of Richmond who had worked with Hill-Christian in city government, said in a statement yesterday that "our loss is the capital city's gain."

A majority of City Council never warmed to Black, who was hired in late 2005 as Richmond's top finance official. In that capacity, he used an emergency-procurement process last winter to contract with a Washington accounting firm to audit the city assessor's office and the public school system without the council's knowledge.

When Harrell was named city manager in his native Chesapeake in March, he offered to remain in Richmond through the city's annual budget process. Instead, Wilder immediately replaced him on an acting basis with Black, who quickly moved into the chief administrative officer's offices on the second floor of City Hall, next to the mayor's office.

The council refused to expedite Black's confirmation as acting chief administrative officer. Opposition to his confirmation mounted after Black began holding back appropriated funds for the public schools system to force it to accept an outside audit. Wilder ratcheted up the pressure in late March by announcing that he had hiring and firing authority over the council's staff, including council members' personal aides, and employees of the assessor's office.

The mayor carried through with his threat a month later, as Black demanded that 54 employees reapply to him for their jobs or lose them. Black fired one person, legislative services director Ellen Bowyer, who refused to reapply. The actions led to a lawsuit by City Council that is scheduled for hearing in Richmond Circuit Court next month.

The council sued the mayor and Black again last month for ordering the forced eviction of Richmond public schools from its offices in City Hall. Circuit Judge Margaret P. Spencer blocked and reversed the move, twice issuing temporary restraining orders at the School Board's request to allow school offices to remain in City Hall at least through Nov. 30.

Spencer plans a hearing Oct. 22 to consider, among other things, the council's motion to intervene in the School Board suit. The council lawsuit directly challenges Black's status as "chief administrative person," as he called himself in a hearing before Spencer, and seeks to invalidate actions he has taken in that capacity. It also proposes to make him and Wilder personally liable for the costs of the aborted eviction.

Wilder has publicly defended Black, but he acknowledged yesterday that the council's lawsuit raises serious concerns for the city.

"It's a concern that it could be a concern to bond-rating agencies," he said in an interview." (Michael Martz, Richmond Times-Dispatch, October 6, 2007)