Montgomery County Executive Ike Leggett on Tuesday unveiled three more department head selections — recommending a former Pennsylvania U.S. attorney to lead the county attorney’s office, a former Amtrak executive to lead technology services, and the present acting director of management and budget to take over that office permanently.
In an afternoon news conference, Leggett announced the appointees: Leon Rodriguez as county attorney, Joseph Beach in the Office of Management and Budget, and E. Steven Emanuel in the Department of Technology Services.
According to Leggett spokesman Patrick Lacefield, the only department head slot left open is in the Department of Environmental Protection, which should be filled in the next month or so.
Rodriguez, a resident of Garrett Park, previously served in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the western district of Pennsylvania as chief of the White Collar Crimes Section, where he managed 100 employees. He also speaks five languages and has worked in the D.C. law firm of Ober, Kaler, Grimes and Shriver for the past six years.
The proposed budget for the County Attorney’s Office in fiscal 2008 comes to about $5.1 million, a 4 percent raiseover this year.
That money is used to provide legal defense for cases involving Montgomery County departments as well as 14 local government self-insurance participants, such as the county’s Board of Education and its Planning Commission. This past year, the office went through a slight restructuring, as county leaders eliminated general counsel and special projects programs in favor of adding specialized litigation sections geared toward Health and Human Services, Finance and Procurement, Human Resources and Appeals, Economic Development and Public Safety.
The appointee for Technology Services, Emanuel, spent nine years with the National Railroad Passenger Corp., where he served as director of Network Operations and Chief Information Officer for Amtrak Corporate in D.C., among other roles. Beach has been employed by Montgomery County for more than 20 years and is serving as acting director of the Management and Budget Office.
“We decided to keep him there in that role,” Lacefield said.
These appointments still must be confirmed by the County Council.
