The most underreported story in WNC could be the amazing job Asheville’s Director of Public Works Mark Combs is doing with his department. Years ago, local lampooner Peter Dawes had nothing but high praise for Combs. He liked to tell the story of when the city wanted to gauge the feasibility of privatizing Combs’ department, and no private sanitation company would even come to the table because they knew they couldn’t do things more efficiently.
And so this year, as Assistant City Manager Jeff Richardson presented staff’s quarterly report to city council, he told of the education and outreach of various departments; the number of meetings they held; and the $521/employee savings and 249-ton reduction in greenhouse gas emissions the Public Works Department would be realizing annually. In response to the impossible-sounding mandate from city council to reduce the city’s emissions by 80% over the next 50 years, Combs changed the construction work schedule to four ten-hour days. This saves the cost of redeploying vehicles and heavy equipment one day a week. Combs said the employees are loving the schedule, and they know productivity has to be greater than or equal to former levels if they don’t want to go back to working five days a week.
