CARLTON FLETCHER: Subadan’s focused on progress, not special interests

“Still, a man hears what he wants to hear and he disregards the rest.”

— Simon & Garfunkel

It’s not like Sharon Subadan’s possible departure from her position as Albany’s city manager would be a shocking bit of business.

The use-by date for people in such positions usually averages out at three to five years, and Subadan has passed five years as the day-to-day operations manager of the city and its quarter-billion-dollar budget.

It’s just that some in Albany — officials and citizens, the former of which should be better informed, the latter guided only by what they heard someone say or the fact that Subadan had the gall to ask for a salary that adequately compensated her for the work she did — are saying they’ll be glad to help the city manager pack her stuff for the move.

A woman asking for that much money? Who does she think she is? One of the TV stations said she was run off from her job in Florida because … well, I don’t remember what for, but it was something sneaky and underhanded. Because they said so on TV.

If, however, Subadan does take the job in Augusta — a job for which she’s one of two finalists — some of these people who are gleefully anticipating the city manager’s departure may find themselves ruing the granting of their wishes.

People have accused me over the years of being an overzealous Subadan supporter. Let me offer a few words about that before continuing.

Like most of the commissioners involved in the process of hiring Subadan, I thought it was a pretty much foregone conclusion that the favorite for the job — a gentleman serving another south Georgia community at the time — would get it. Everyone sang his praises, and his resume was impeccable. Subadan came with a cloud of controversy hanging over her head, a cloud “reported” but not investigated by some local media outlets. (Somebody somewhere said it; it must be true.)

But I remember talking with commissioners who interviewed Subadan shortly after they’d met with the four finalists here, and to a person they said she’d nailed her interview, some of them apparently amazed that they’d been swayed when their mind had been all but set.

Subadan took over the operations of a city that was stuck in something of a holding pattern, its managers over the past decade or so — good men, all — having failed to convince the commissions they served under to do anything about problems that lay just beneath the surface, particularly a crumbling infrastructure that city leaders had pretty much deemed “out of sight, out of mind.” When past city managers all but begged, cajoled and wheedled commissioners to quit kicking that infrastructure can down the road, they chose instead to dish out pork to favored interest groups. Ironically, when one succeeded in getting city funds for his group, another would demand the same for his special interest supporters, usually drawing on the race factor to get his folks’ “fair share” at the trough.

Enter Subadan. Here’s a woman who walked in the door talking about infrastructure, about recruiting — and paying them what they’re worth — better employees rather than more. She insisted a more vibrant downtown had to be a priority if the city were going to return to past prominence. But talking means little; hell, her predecessors had put the same emphasis on the city’s issues. It was her ability to convince a city government — one that had long cared more about getting re-elected and taking care of cronies than looking at the city’s future — that they had to start prioritizing the right projects that showed Subadan’s true mettle.

I could offer a long list of accomplishments during her tenure — and will at some point when/if she does decide to leave — but that’s more of a PR-type job. Instead, I’ll suggest citizens ride around Albany proper — from the south and east sides to the north and west — and really look at the changes that have come about in the city over the past five years. Ask Derrick Brown — one of Subadan’s best promotions — to give you a rundown of the city’s finances. Ask Flint Riverkeeper Gordon Rogers about Subadan’s response to the city’s sewer crisis.

Then tell me how wrong I am to praise this woman — not for her personality or any other superficial quality — but for the work that’s been done during her watch.

If you’re a member of a special interest group getting a lesser helping of pork now or you’re an official with an agenda and she’s refused to follow your unshakable and irrefutable wisdom, I can see why you’re celebrating the possible departure of Sharon Subadan. If you’re a citizen of this city who wants to see it grow and become all it can be, though, you’ll be concerned. Certainly, Subadan’s not the only one who can move this city forward.

But she’s one who can … and she’s proved that over the past five years.