Chief streamlines homeland security
“We’ve got some great, capable people here. What I want to do is move them into other areas.” Kevin Davis, director of the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness
Kevin Davis is making sweeping staff changes less than two months after taking over as head of the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness.
“We’ve got some great, capable people here. What I want to do is move them into other areas,” Davis said Friday.
Davis let two people go, reduced the salaries of four others and changed the job duties of 10 workers.
His spokeswoman, Veronica Mosgrove, said Davis observed the office for several weeks before making the changes.
The Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness has a staff of nearly 400 workers. The office gets the most notice during a hurricane, when it becomes the state’s command center. In the days after Hurricane Katrina, then-President George W. Bush flew to GOHSEP’s Baton Rouge compound and thanked the staff for its work in coordinating the emergency response.
Let go Friday were two grant specialists with annual salaries of less than $40,000 each.
The agency’s employees are what is known as unclassified state workers, meaning they work at the will of their agency leader without job protections.
Mosgrove said the specialists lost their jobs not because of performance but as part of a bid to reduce the office’s overall payroll.
Davis characterized the terminations as reductions.
Other changes:
- The office’s chief of staff position was eliminated, displacing Mark Riley, who will become deputy director of disaster recovery. Riley’s salary will decrease from $129,000 to $125,000.
- Mark DeBosier, deputy director of disaster recovery, now is the state coordinating officer with an annual salary of $109,000, which is $2,000 less per year than he was making.
- Pat Santos, deputy director of emergency management, is keeping his $125,000 salary intact but taking on additional job duties. He will oversee emergency management, homeland security and interoperability.
- Christina Dayries, assistant deputy director of management, finance and interoperability, now will be deputy director of management and finance. Her $93,500 salary will stay the same.
- Brant Mitchell, deputy director of management, finance and interoperability, will be section chief of imagery and interoperability. His pay is being reduced from $114,000 to $95,000.
- Clay Rives, deputy director of homeland security, will be section chief of homeland security with an annual pay of $95,000. Rives was making $104,000.
Santos took the helm of GOHSEP when Mark Cooper left to work for Wal-Mart Corp. Gov. Bobby Jindal selected Davis to take Cooper’s place even though Santos wanted to keep the job on a permanent basis. Davis became the state disaster leader in December. He previously was president of St. Tammany Parish.
Jindal slashed state agencies’ budgets late last year to deal with a shortfall in the middle of the fiscal year.
Davis said Friday that the staff changes did not occur because the governor ordered him to cut costs.
He said he is streamlining.
“I’m moving people,” Davis said. “There’s no new positions, no new hires.”