County Manager Barbara Donnellan.
(Photo courtesy Arlington County)

People may still be asking questions about what happened to her former boss, but newly appointed Arlington County Manager Barbara Donnellan isn’t letting that stop her from getting down to business.

Donnellan got the job after a surprising shakeup in the county’s government last week. Former manager Michael Brown resigned on Thursday; Donnellan was promoted from deputy county manager to county manager at a last-minute board meeting Friday morning.

Questions still remain about Brown’s departure; the board accepted his voluntary resignation, but also paid him a $110,000 severance, as the Sun Gazette reported. Such a payment seems unusual for an employee who had been with the county less than five months and left voluntarily, as Blue Virginia points out.

Still, Donnellan says she doesn’t believe the transition will be "disruptive" within the manager’s office, or the rest of the county government. "As a deputy, you do a lot with the manager anyway,” she says. She’s been actively working on things like the Crystal City Sector Plan and the East Falls Church redevelopment plan, she adds.

The first big challenge, however, will be directing this year’s budget process. Donnellan will have to provide a county manager’s budget to the board in February, and that budget could include program cuts for the third year in a row. "The thing that’s most prevalent is the budget coming forward," she says. "It’s not going to be as bad as last year, but it’s going to be something we have to work on and pay attention to because we’re following on two years of cuts."

Donnellan served as acting county manager for seven months prior to Brown’s taking the job, which is another reason she feels the transition won’t be too difficult for county staff. (Staff members seem to be on her side; they filled the county board room last Friday when her appointment was announced, and her e-mail in-box was “full of congratulations” from staff members, Donnellan says.)

"The difference is, I just did this for seven months five months ago," Donnellan says. "They know that I have done the job, and I’m a known entity. I’ve been here a long time, for 27 years."

So why didn’t Donnellan get the job the first time? She wasn't sure she wanted it — and, by many accounts, the county was looking for some new blood from outside the area to bring in a new perspective. “I think the board really wanted to try for an outside perspective. It had been within the county for many, many years,” she says.

But her time in the interim position lasted for more than a couple of months, and Donnellan "began to get into a rhythm," she says. By then, the county was already deep into its external search.

That rhythm, and the confidence she had begun to feel in the role, came to mind last week when the need for a county manager switch became imminent. "When things changed this week, the board approached me, and I said to them ‘I have to think about it,'" she says. "And I thought, 'you know what, maybe my work’s not done here, and I can end my career at some point in the future, working with the staff and in the community.'"

"That’s the one great thing about local government," she adds. "You can look out your window in your community and say, 'I helped make that happen.'"