Jan 05, 2007  |  By: LOU CHIBBARO J  | COMMENTS     

D.C.’s new mayor is keeping two of his predecessor’s most senior openly gay appointees but is transferring them to different positions.

Mayor Adrian Fenty has also named new directors for the city’s Latino, Asian-Pacific Islander and African affairs offices, but has yet to announce whether he would retain or replace lesbian activist Darlene Nipper as head of the Office of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Affairs.

Fenty said at a Dec. 28 news conference that a decision would be made this week but nothing had been announced by the time the Blade went to press Wednesday. Fenty also announced at the news conference that he would appoint Patrick Canavan, former Mayor Anthony Williams’ openly gay director of the Department of Consumer & Regulatory Affairs, as the new chief operating officer of St. Elizabeth’s Hospital, the city’s public psychiatric hospital.

The following day, Fenty named Lars Etzkorn, the openly gay deputy director of the Department of Transportation under Williams, as the new director of the city’s Office of Property Management.

Fenty also announced he would retain Dr. Gregg Pane as director of the Department of Health but decided to replace Marsha Martin as head of the Administration for HIV Policy & Programs, which falls under the jurisdiction of the health department.

 “As a Williams appointee, it is my time to leave the government and I do so with great respect and admiration for this agency,” Martin said in a Jan. 3 e-mail to her staff. “Together, you have changed and re-ignited the conversation about the HIV epidemic in Washington, D.C.”

Martin had received mixed reviews since assuming the post as head of the AIDS administration in 2005. She had been praised for initiating a massive campaign to have nearly all city residents tested for HIV as a means of curtailing the spread of the disease. But an audit by the District’s Inspector General’s office in October found continuing problems with the administration’s monitoring of grants and contracts totaling millions of dollars.

And critics recently pointed out that one year after Martin took office, the city’s process for monitoring the number of HIV cases through epidemiological tracking procedures required by the federal government remained behind by several years, preventing the city from knowing how many residents have HIV. Martin’s supporters say she inherited most of these problems and should be credited with taking steps to begin fixing them.

Canavan and Etzkorn are among more than a dozen high-level officials from the Williams administration that Fenty has chosen to retain, either in their current or in new positions.

The two gay officials will be moving from larger to smaller city agencies, a development that might raise speculation about whether the changes could be considered a demotion.

Peter Rosenstein, a gay Fenty campaign adviser who also served on Fenty’s mayoral transition team, said that while St. Elizabeth’s Hospital and the Office of Property Management are smaller agencies than the ones Canavan and Etzkorn worked for under Williams, each are considered vital to the city. The two agencies also face considerable problems and Fenty’s decision to tap Canavan and Etzkorn to head them shows the new mayor has full confidence in their ability to make needed improvements, Rosenstein said.

“I don’t think these appointments can be considered a demotion,” Rosenstein said.

Canavan and Etzkorn could not be reached by press time.

Canavan is a licensed clinical psychologist with a doctorate degree in psychology and special training in forensic psychology. He also studied public administration at George Washington and Harvard Universities and received certification as a public manager.

He began his tenure with the District of Columbia government as a clinical administrator at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital. From there, Williams moved him to the Office of the City Administrator and later named him director of the city’s Office of Neighborhood Services.

Fenty said Canavan’s experience in the field of psychology and public administration makes him especially suitable to head the sprawling St. Elizabeth’s campus located in Southeast Washington.

Etzkorn, an attorney, worked as an economic development official for St. Louis, where he directed various downtown development projects, before Williams appointed him in 2000 as associate director of the D.C. Department of Transportation. In that post, Etzkorn headed the department’s public space management division, which included snow removal and street and bridge maintenance, among other duties. In July, he moved up to the position of the department’s deputy director.

The Office of Property Management, which Etzkorn will now head, is charged with managing the city’s public lands and buildings. Among other things, the office manages 334 facilities or buildings that house at least ...