The Whirlwind in the Fedora: Speed and Service Trump Symbolism in Fenty's Governing

The mayor walks into Ben's Chili Bowl at breakfast time, and it's the hat -- the dashing black wide-brimmed number he sports through the cold months -- that first catches diners' eyes.

Adrian Fenty is greeted with smiles, extended hands and a few quick requests for a word. This mayor is no Marion Barry: The room doesn't exactly fall silent. But Fenty is no Tony Williams, either: He makes certain to exchange a couple of words with every potential voter, passing requests for assistance to the staffer at his side.

Fenty's first year was, predictably, a whirlwind of activity. You don't hear much about any grand Fenty vision; that was Williams's thing. You might even hear that this mayor is too caught up in the minutia of constituent service. The mayor would probably plead guilty to that charge.

Fenty rarely reaches for the symbolic. He's not one to preach about hope. Fenty's failed effort to get the U.S. Mint to put the slogan "Taxation Without Representation" on the District's quarter was a rare venture into that sort of politics.

(Slammed down fast and hard by the feds, the mayor now has a Plan B, the relatively tame "Justice for All." "In a way, it means the same thing," he offers.)

This mayor is more comfortable talking about how to make things work. He is deeply impatient. If the bureaucracy doesn't move as quickly as he wants it to, his instinct is to find an end run. Frustrated in his effort to create an early out for city workers, he went ahead on his own, to the consternation of D.C. Council member Carol Schwartz. Fenty plans more staff cuts -- big ones.

That's why he doesn't seem especially perturbed by warnings from Chief Financial Officer Natwar Gandhi that the city faces a significant budget crunch. "If we can make five or six years of work happen in five or six months of time, we will get through this well," he says.

Agitating for big reductions in force is not the same as making it happen. Last week, Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee made her first big sweep of the broom, firing 98 central office employees.

"The ability to fire at will is a tremendous boost to performance," Fenty says. "Because there's accountability. The number one people who want the central administration held accountable are the teachers. You go into a school, and the only air conditioner that works properly is the one in the executive suite. The teachers and the children have not been the priority. That culture has to change."

At the Child and Family Services Agency, where Fenty fired six workers in the wake of the tragic killings of Banita Jacks's four children, some employees say the firings have not inspired hard work but rather resentment that colleagues were sacrificed on the altar of public opinion. Fenty rejects that reading of events and says the government urgently needs rank-and-file workers to embrace their responsibilities.

But he says change won't happen without agency leaders who share his view of government as service provider. "It really comes down to leadership," he says. "The biggest thing I learned in my tour with the top five mayors was it all comes down to who's running the agencies -- the ability to nip things in the bud and keep a small thing from becoming a big one."

But Fenty is sticking up for Gandhi, despite the embarrassing $50 million tax office scandal. The mayor says the finance chief's decade of accomplishment "overwhelms what is still a very serious negative" -- the failure to prevent or discover the wholesale stealing.

Fenty says that by accepting responsibility and firing those directly supervising the accused workers, Gandhi "sent a clear message that this behavior will not be tolerated." But some of the mayor's critics wonder how Gandhi and Child and Family Services Director Sharlynn Bobo can continue atop their agencies given Fenty's emphasis on accountability.

The mayor says he wants department heads who manage with urgency, and he's willing to suffer errors in the service of creative, risk-taking management.

In addition to Rhee -- about whom the mayor gushes, "What can you say about her? She goes to every school. She returns every phone call" -- Fenty is especially proud of his hires to run the police, transportation, fire, motor vehicles and aging departments. What they have in common is a devotion to reacting to problems at Internet speed, to fend off bad news stories and to send the message that service is paramount. Agency heads who don't operate that way aren't going to keep their jobs -- not because a particular decision was wrong, but because they don't react with the dynamism Mayor BlackBerry demands.