Community Development Chief Takes Library Job

Just weeks after an audit blasted his agency for mishandling the L.A. Bridges program, Parker Anderson has left his position as general manager of the city Community Development Department for a lower-level job in the library system.

Mayor Richard Riordan has named the city’s former environmental affairs director, Lillian Kawasaki, to head the department.

Anderson announced in January that he planned to move to a new position in the library department. Anderson declined to comment Thursday, but sources said the transfer was made at the quiet urging of the mayor, who has been dissatisfied with the city’s progress on key programs.

On March 31, City Controller Rick Tuttle issued an audit that blamed Anderson’s department for many of the problems that Tuttle said made Bridges an ineffective program to keep at-risk youths out of gangs.

Tuttle recommended that the program be scrapped and a new program be created. However, the council recently voted to keep the program going a year, in turn resulting in a veto by Riordan.

A spokesman for the mayor said it was Anderson’s decision to leave as general manager to become a chief management analyst two levels below the city librarian, where he will oversee outreach programs for volunteers and seniors.

Under a special ordinance approved to smooth the transition, Anderson will retain his $140,794 annual salary.