Countywide

Ray Silver, the city manager of Coronado for the past eight years, was named director of the San Diego County Planning Department on Wednesday.

Silver, 38, will succeed former Planning Director Walter Ladwig, who was removed from the post last spring by Chief Administrative Officer Norman Hickey as part of what top county officials have described as a reorganization of several major county departments.

Ladwig’s removal came after a lengthy study of the Planning Department, which oversees development of the county’s unincorporated area, concluded that it was poorly managed and unresponsive to the public.

Silver, who joined Coronado in 1977 as the city’s director of administrative services and became city manager two years later, will assume the $80,000-a-year job on Sept. 18, Hickey announced. Before working in Coronado, Silver served in various public management jobs in Pasadena, West Covina and Madera.