This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2017, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Salt Lake City Mayor Jackie Biskupski was close to solving what's become a nagging issue for her year-old administration.
In Marc A. Woolley, an attorney with a work history at high-profile institutions on the East Coast, Biskupski appeared to have found a candidate to lead the Redevelopment Agency (RDA) who initially impressed City Council members and was prepared to join her administration.
Woolley was teed up to become chief operating officer of the RDA, an agency that targets blighted urban areas and directs public and private dollars to developments that spur economic growth. The agency is central to the city's efforts to generate affordable housing amid dual crises of rental shortages and surging homelessness.
But after The Salt Lake Tribune reported this weekend about lawsuits and other controversies from Woolley's past work experience, Biskupski pulled his nomination, leaving a vacancy in her administration and sparking questions from the council about her ability to find willing and qualified candidates for key posts moving forward.
"It looks like there is a serious backlog of issues going on down there with [the mayor's] staff. What's going on?" asked City Councilman James Rogers.
While many Biskupski nominees have easily received City Council approval, some vacancies have proved difficult to fill.
In addition to finding a leader of the RDA to manage its day-to-day operations, Biskupski is looking for a director of the city's transportation division. She'll also have a vacancy to fill at Salt Lake City International Airport as Maureen Riley is slated for retirement June 30, after 10 years at the helm and in the midst of a nearly $3 billion expansion.
Some of her past issues with unfilled positions are self-inflicted, as Biskupski decided after taking office she would replace members of her predecessor's staff, including Rick Graham, 35-year veteran as head of the Salt Lake City Public Services department.
In February 2016, Biskupski unveiled April Townsend as her pick to head that agency, an appointment that gave Councilwoman Lisa Adams pause.
"I asked 45 minutes worth of questions" during Townsend's confirmation hearing, Adams said Friday. "Fifty percent of them she couldn't answer to my satisfaction."
Nevertheless, Townsend was appointed only to resign less than a month later, saying she wanted to focus on advancing her education. The position was later filled by Lisa Shaffer.
Shortly after taking office, Biskupski also picked Mike Reberg to lead the Department of Public Utilities.
Reberg, Adams said, "ended up withdrawing his name when he realized he was way over his head for that job." Eventually, Laura Briefer, the No. 2 person in the department, was promoted and Reberg was named director of Community and Neighborhoods.
"I don't think we would ever question the quality of the individuals who were put forward," said Matthew Rojas, Biskupski's spokeswoman.
It wasn't inexperience that toppled Woolley. His resume was long and impressive.
An attorney by profession, Woolley worked at the Philadelphia Housing Authority, where he had been entangled in whistleblower lawsuits, and then went to work for the Delaware River Port Authority.
He later joined the prominent and politically connected law firm Ballard, Spahr, Andrews & Ingersoll, where he worked for three years before heading to the $12.5 billion Hershey Trust Co.
Biskupski picked Woolley from a group of about a dozen candidates after a nationwide search with help from Lisa Fritts, director of economic development, and her chief of staff, her spokesman said.
As his nomination moved toward the final stage, a vote by the seven-member City Council, Biskupski's office took a new approach.
"This time around they wanted to make sure everyone had met their [pick]," said Adams, who is chairwoman of the RDA board. "I think that was smart."
Woolley met with Adams and RDA vice chairman and City Councilman Derek Kitchen last week, their first chance to ask him questions about issues in his work history.
"My question to him when I met him two days ago was in regards to why he was let go of the most recent position that he had," Kitchen said Friday.
Many of the questions that led to his name being withdrawn from contention came from public documents, lawsuits and news articles available online.
During his time at Ballard Spahr, Woolley worked on a case for a new, $200 million court, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported.
Ballard Spahr attorneys on the case, which included Woolley, failed to raise alarms when they reviewed development documents that showed a man hired to be the court system's representative in the proposed deal also joined the developer of the project, a potential conflict of interest, the Inquirer said.
The FBI would later investigate the deal with the court representative, the newspaper reported.
Woolley wasn't accused of wrongdoing in the court development case.
"There have been no issues with me regarding my time and the Family Court matter," Woolley said Monday. "I can tell you I have never been implicated with regard to misuse of time or anything."
City Councilman Charlie Luke was looking forward to asking Woolley to answer for some of the questions raised by The Tribune's reporting.
"I personally had some concern with the way it was withheld," he said. "But I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt and sit down with him before I made my mind up."
Woolley, who said he had his suitcase packed Monday and was prepared to fly to Salt Lake City before receiving a brief call from Fritts, calling off the trip and scheduled meetings Tuesday with council members followed by a public vote.
Biskupski wasn't available Monday for an interview on her decision to nominate Woolley. Rojas said the agencies with vacancies require nominees with a narrow field of expertise that can be difficult to find.
He highlighted Fritts' involvement in the decision to move forward with Woolley, and also with her decision to back away, before Biskupski agreed with both.
"They made it collectively, but because Lara is the leader of the RDA and is overseeing that, the mayor certainly deferred to Lara's opinion on this," Rojas said.
He said the city planned to start the search from scratch.
Twitter: @TaylorWAnderson