by James A. Bacon

April Bingham, Richmond’s director of public works, has stepped down in what Mayor Danny Avula described as a voluntary and amicable parting of the ways. In the wake of the cutoff of water supplies to residents of Richmond and neighboring counties last week, Avula said, “there probably are other skills that have emerged as what we need in terms of oversight at the water treatment plant.”

Bingham, who had previously run the customer-service operation, had no engineering background. Her interim replacement, Anthony “Scott” Morris, does. Morris, currently a chief deputy for Virginia’s Department of Environmental Quality, spent four years working in wastewater plant operations in Richmond.

It is notable that Avula managed the transition with a minimum of recrimination. Nobody had asked Bingham to resign, reports the Richmond Times-Dispatch. Asked whether he would have fired her, Avula said he and Bingham had had “a lot of conversations over the last two weeks as we (thought) about the next phase of leadership.”

“We’re really grateful for … the work she’s put in,” he said.

Bingham was allowed to resign with her dignity intact, which seems appropriate under the circumstances.

It is not yet known if Bingham’s performance contributed directly or indirectly to the equipment failures that interrupted Richmond’s water service. Hopefully, a pending independent investigation will shed light. But it is abundantly clear that the waterworks woes were years in the making and preceded her tenure as chief of public works. It is also obvious that restoring service and upgrading the system will require technical knowledge that she does not possess.

Richmond’s Water-Gate fiasco has exposed years of underfunding and neglect of maintenance and repairs. Finding the money to bring the antiquated system up to standard will be expensive and major political challenge. But things could be worse. Just look at Los Angeles as it deals with its devastating wildfires.

The first difference between Richmond and L.A. is leadership. Avula, a Democrat, was on top of the job from the moment it was apparent Richmond had a problem. Ignoring numerous warnings that the county was at risk of a conflagration, L.A. Mayor Karen Bass, also a Democrat, traveled to Ghana. Avula’s priority was taking decisive action; the mayor of La La Land’s priority since her return was dodging accountability. Avula decisively implemented a change in public works leadership; Bass fired the fire chief after she revealed the city’s grotesque underfunding of the fire department… then backtracked.

A second difference is the political environment. As far down the Diversity-Equity-Inclusion rabbit hole as Richmond has fallen — one of Bingham’s qualifications for the public works job was her DEI work — it hasn’t burrowed halfway to China like L.A. has. I have seen no sign that Avula is experiencing blowback from his easing Bingham, a Black woman, out of the job — a fact that may be attributable to the gentle way in which he managed the transition. Charges of racism and sexism might surface, but I don’t think they will, and if they do, I don’t think they will gain any traction. By contrast, L.A. is so infected with the politics of race, sex and gender that it’s difficult to imagine any personnel changes taking place without massive and paralyzing controversy.

A third difference is that while Virginia is a blue state in national elections, Republicans hold the three statewide offices. By contrast, California is a one-party state. States with two strong political parties hold each other accountable for screw-ups. We still have that in Virginia. California doesn’t. Virginia will have two investigations into Water-Gate — one initiated by the city, one by the state. If there is ever an inquiry into the L.A. wildfires, who can doubt that it will be slanted to provide political cover for whoever ordered it?

Had the Richmond water fiasco occurred at a different time, I might have been more jaundiced. The chronic underfunding of the city’s waterworks is unforgivable. But after observing the Rose Bowl-scaled parade of failures in the Tarnished Gold State, I’m thinking things could be a lot worse here. A lot worse. I wouldn’t go so far as to say I have hope for the future. Let’s just say I am less despairing!