Harris County votes to add administrator position to 'upgrade their governance structure'

Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo is celebrating the creation of a county administrator position as a win for the area. 

The Harris County Commissioners voted along party lines in the decision, as covered in a Click2Houston article. 

"Commissioners Court has approved the creation of a county administrator position. We'll now catch up with other major counties across the state and nation, Republican- and Democrat-led, in having this position," Hidalgo said in a Twitter post. 

The position will be tasked with making county operations and services "more streamlined, coordinated, transparent and efficient," Hidalgo said in a Twitter post. 

Now that the position is approved, the new administrator has 45 days to develop a plan for a new structure for the county government, as detailed in an article by Click2Houston.

"Many other counties and all but one large county in Texas have already upgraded their governance structure by creating a county administrator, including Bexar, Dallas, El Paso and Tarrant counties," Hidalgo said in a Twitter post. 

The executive director of the county's budget department, David Berry, is the inaugural county administrator, as detailed in an article by the Community Impact Newspaper. 

"The appointment of a county administrator by three members of Commissioners Court could effectively remove the responsibility from your elected official(s) and strip residents of their ability to have local representation," said Harris County Commissioner Tom Ramsey (R-Pct. 3) in a letter prior to the vote. "There has not been any public discussion or input about this occurring."

Hidalgo wrote in a letter prior to the vote, as covered by the Community Impact Newspaper, that the court had already approved an agreement in 2019 with PFM Consulting Group Inc. to do an "organizational and operational review of Harris County government." 

The report was published in November, as stated in the Community Impact Newspaper, and recommended that there be "structural reforms to streamline the government's current organization, such as the creation of a county administrator position."