Tom TierneySEATTLE—May 27, 2004—Tom Tierney recalls a conversation with his father, Tom senior, then a healthcare executive in Colorado. The younger Tom was all the hippie: full of himself, hair to his shoulders, in active rebellion. Tom remembers his dad shaking an angry finger at him.
"It wasn't about my hair or my dress," says Tom. "He was mad because he thought I was blowing off my responsibility to public service. In my family, public service was everyone's mission."
So, when the Seattle Housing Authority board pointed at Tom, he heeded his father's lesson, carefully weighing the public service values of his Port of Seattle position and those associated with serving as the leader of Seattle Housing.
I loved my job at the port, but the ability to affect directly thousands of lives at SHA is pretty powerful stuff. It's the only job I would have left the port for," he says.
Now, on the job for a month, Tierney is settling in for the hard part of his new public service: filling the very big shoes of Harry Thomas, preparing for the federal government's not-so-gradual withdrawal from its traditional public housing role, and properly finishing the projects that have been started.
"We have $150 million in federal funds leveraging almost $1 billion in private investment. Our vision is to remake the heart and soul of our housing stock." he says. "I take note that today about 100 acres of that vision are mud, where houses used to be. I intend for houses to be there again in two years. We've got a lot of construction to get through."
In fact, the hardware of the SHA makeover is falling into place. New Holly is in its last phase. High Point now has its first building complete and Tierney is looking forward to the start of housing construction at Rainier Vista very soon.
While new to SHA leadership, Tierney is an old hand at New Holly. As the head of Seattle Mayor Norm Rice's Office of Management and Planning, Tierney was given the job of managing the City's relationship with this complex project. Even though the buildings at NewHolly are now nearly complete, Tierney says there is a lot to do yet.
"We're not just building houses there, as nice as they are. Until we know that we've truly created community, we won't be done."
Tierney recently got a hint of what it will take to fill Harry Thomas' shoes. He accompanied him to Washington, D.C. so he could begin meeting Harry's connections in the capitol.
"They held a retirement reception for Harry while we were there. Two Senators active in housing issues spoke at the event and you could just sense the respect, even affection, they had for Harry. One called him a titan of federal housing," he said. "No one has ever called me a titan."
"I later learned something telling about Harry from his daughter, who I told what important people in Washington were saying about her dad," Tom said. "'Oh," she said, ‘he never tells us about that kind of stuff.'"
"Harry's famous about being low profile and quiet and was very effective with his style," says Tierney. "I'll be a little different. Some of the things we've got coming at us may require a different style. It's not only the fact that the federal government is reducing its commitment to housing, but the effects of Sound Transit development on the Housing Authority are a significant opportunity that we must seize. We've got a lot of players to talk to."
Tierney may need his strongest voice to use in the coming financial crunch.
"The federal government is working on a new approach that will result in significant cuts to our operating subsidies here in Seattle and across the country," he says. "There will be very little money for future rebuilding projects such as we've undertaken. And, our operating subsidies will go down significantly. For an organization that maintains as many structures as we do, this is a tremendous problem."
"Affordable housing is no longer the Washington, D.C. game it once was," Tierney says. "Now, affordable housing gets built and maintained through the creation of partnerships at local and state levels. Actually, that plays to our strengths. We have a terrific private non-profit community here to go with some of the best for-profit affordable housing developers in the country."
Tom carries on the belief in public service his dad emphasized so strongly. The senior Tom Tierney 's innovative health care ideas for the elderly were noticed by the Kennedy's. He was called to Washington and went on to serve in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations and is one of the people credited with the founding of the Medicare program.
Ultimately, Tom cut his hair and began his own journey, heading west into a public service career that caused people to notice him and call him to the Housing Authority at an historic time.
"This is where my mission is," says Tom, "and it is one that I relish. I can't wait to meet more of the people who live in SHA housing. I know from my past work, that the strongest satisfaction from the job comes from getting to know the people you serve."
About the author
Bob Royer is Director of Communications for Seattle City Light. He has a background as a journalist and also serviced as Deputy Mayor under Charles Royer.