LOCAL

Doug McGowen will be new MLGW CEO, leave city of Memphis

Samuel Hardiman
Memphis Commercial Appeal
Doug McGowen, chief operating officer for the city of Memphis, speaks Tuesday, Oct. 22, 2019, during the UpSkill 901 Workforce Summit and the University of Memphis' University Center.

Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland said Wednesday that Doug McGowen, the city's longtime chief operating officer, will leave his role at the city and be Strickland's nominee to lead Memphis, Light, Gas and Water as its CEO.

Strickland made the announcement Wednesday and, in doing so, offered a proposed replacement for outgoing CEO J.T. Young before Young departs for Florida Power and Light on Oct. 14.

MLGW Board Chairman Mitch Graves will continue to serve as interim CEO until about mid-November with Alonzo Weaver, the utility's longtime chief operating officer, overseeing the day-to-day running of the utility.

The announcement Wednesday ushered in a new chapter for one of the city's longstanding and productive political partnerships -- McGowen and Strickland.

"It's been the honor of my life to serve this community in this capacity as chief operating officer," McGowen said. I am beyond honored Mayor Strickland would ask me to do this and unbelievably grateful that I will be able to continue to serve this wonderful community in a different but equally important capacity."

McGowen's name had been bandied about for the MLGW post in recent weeks. Some have called for widespread change at the city-owned utility following two infrastructure crises.

McGowen brings a reputation for cutting through complicated bureaucracies to improve operations. It was often said at Memphis City Hall that when Strickland wanted something done, he sent McGowen.

"Doug McGowen has been someone I have relied on countless times to help deliver our vision for the direction of this city. Doug gets things done," Strickland said Wednesday.

The mayor acknowledged the struggles the utility has faced and said he thought McGowen was the ideal person to tackle the challenges being the leader of MLGW will bring.

"We all want our utility to be there for us every day and to reliably deliver the services we all count on," Strickland said. "I can think of no I trust more than Doug McGowen to lead the organization. No one is more capable, reliable, forthright and forward-thinking whether through day-to-day operations or hours of crisis."

The chief operating officer, a former Navy fighter pilot who ran the Naval Support Activity Mid-South in Millington before he retired, joined the Strickland administration as COO after serving as part of the mayor's Innovation Team under former Mayor A C Wharton, whom Strickland defeated in 2015.

Strickland will appoint Chandell Ryan, the longtime deputy chief operating officer, to fill McGowen's place. Both appointments are pending Memphis City Council approval and require a simple seven-vote majority. The city plans on asking for the council's approval at its next meeting on Oct. 11.

McGowen also will remain on Strickland's senior leadership team, giving the administration a conduit between City Hall and the MLGW building down Main Street.

McGowen leaving the city follows Ursula Madden, the city's chief communications officer, leaving the administration last week. He is another high-profile exit as Strickland, who is term-limited, prepares to leave the office at end of 2023.

McGowen helped lead city for seven years, through pandemic

In an interview Tuesday, McGowen said he was proud of the data-driven approach Memphis had taken to city government and the improvements made to city services during his tenure.

McGowen noted the implementation of needs-based prekindergarten, the long but eventually successful push for Memphis Area Transit Authority funding, and the $200 million Accelerate Memphis bond package that brought significant investment to city parks and neighborhoods as among the things he is most proud of his time at City Hall.

The MATA funding and Accelerate Memphis are two policy initiatives tied to the city's efforts for deeper, more thoughtful urban planning. The city's comprehensive plan, Memphis 3.0, reflects, in part, McGowen and others' desire for regeneration within the city's urban neighborhoods and stemming the tide of suburbanization that stretched city services to the brink.

McGowen's most public-facing job in the city was as one of the leaders of the regional pandemic response during 2020 and early 2021. He helped oversee the Memphis and Shelby County Joint Taskforce. His almost-daily appearances at news conferences were characterized by a steady presence and his beloved jacket — a black-and-white striped zip-up purchased at Lansky's and augmented by a city of Memphis seal.

He said Tuesday that Memphis and Shelby County's success was a collaborative effort among a vast array of partners and it changed health outcomes for the better in Shelby County.

When Gov. Bill Lee and the Tennessee Department of Health took away Shelby County's government vaccine distribution powers in early 2021 and handed them to the city, Strickland tasked McGowen with running the vaccine response, which drew favorable comparisons to how operations ran under Shelby County.

The departing COO said Tuesday that the MLGW job represented another opportunity to make change and improve lives.

"It was likely that when a new mayor comes in, they were going to want a new chief operating officer so I knew there would come a day when I would be seeking another opportunity," McGowen said.

He said he hoped to drive change at MLGW through working on economic development projects, helping steward the city, and MLGW's efforts to install LED lights and further tree canopy maintenance to alleviate foliage-caused outages.

"At the end of the day, I think people want stable prices and reliable power and I think we can do a lot there to help cement that into place," McGowen said.

McGowen will lead utility at crucial time

If confirmed by the Memphis City Council, McGowen will take the helm of MLGW at the conclusion of a nearly four-year-long evaluation of whether to leave the Tennessee Valley Authority, which supplies Memphis and Shelby County with all of its electricity.

Last month, Young recommended MLGW stay with TVA and sign a perpetual, 20-year rolling agreement with the federal power provider. Environmental groups and renewable energy organizations have said doing so would be a mistake and remove any leverage Memphians have over the federal agency.

MLGW signing such an agreement would require MLGW board approval and the Memphis City Council voting yes or no on the contract. There's no current timeline for such a vote and MLGW announced Sunday that it would continue public comment indefinitely.

McGowen declined to say whether he would continue the course by signing a long-term deal with TVA.

"It'd be inappropriate for me to comment on that until such time as I've had time to talk with the staff and the board of directors," he said Tuesday.

Throughout the past four years, McGowen, and Strickland, have sought to remain neutral in the power supply process amid heavy lobbying. McGowen sat on the Power Supply Advisory Team, a volunteer board appointed to provide input on Memphis' power supply decision, in 2019 and 2020.

He and Strickland hired an independent consultant, Enervision, to help the city administration wade through the competing and complex legal and scientific claims involved in the power supply process.

The incoming MLGW CEO has also clashed with the utility he's nominated to lead. This year, McGowen and the Strickland administration took long-held frustrations over how MLGW handles repairing street cuts -- the emergency holes dug in a street when infrastructure repairs are needed -- public.

He confronted MLGW leadership at a contentious meeting this spring, revealing a squabble between the utility owned by taxpayers and city government. The squabble remains unsettled but MLGW has agreed to pay the city some of what Memphis says it is owed.

Salary is unclear

McGowen said his salary and contract situation had not been worked out and that how much the position paid was not a "material" concern in his decision to take the job.

Young, the departing CEO, made $320,000 a year. McGowen, as chief operating officer, makes about $159,000.

Reporter Corinne S Kennedy contributed to this report.

Samuel Hardiman covers Memphis city government and politics for The Commercial Appeal. He can be reached by email at samuel.hardiman@commercialappeal.com or followed on Twitter at @samhardiman.