Wilkinson Named Interim City Administrator
Date:
03/17/2010Summary:
The Yuma City Council named Greg Wilkinson as Interim City Administrator on Wednesday evening, selecting a City employee who has a high level of technical expertise that has earned international acclaim and experience in leadership roles.Contact:
Project Manager Of Award-Winning Public Safety Communications System To Hold Post During Search For Watson's Replacement
Yuma, Arizona - The Yuma City Council named Greg Wilkinson as Interim City Administrator during its regularly scheduled meeting Wednesday evening, selecting a City employee who has a high level of technical expertise that has earned international acclaim and experience in leadership roles.Wilkinson will hold the position as the City goes through its process to replace Mark Watson, whose resignation takes effect March 26.
Wilkinson has been with the City of Yuma for the past 10 years as the Assistant Information Technology Director for Telecommunications. He oversees the City's fixed and wireless networks, public safety systems, network and RF engineering and systems administration for the City's servers, PBX systems and network equipment.
Of particular note is his work with as project manager for the Yuma Regional Communications System, which has been awarded both internationally and by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for its progress in improving both inter-agency and intra-agency communications among various public safety agencies. The City of Yuma and Yuma County can now connect seamlessly with each other and their home bases, and other agencies ranging from state to federal have also signed onto the project via joint agreements.
Wilkinson is also active in the community. He currently serves as president of the Yuma Elementary School District 1 Governing Board, on which he has served overall for the last 8 years.
Prior to his work with the City of Yuma, Wilkinson was with the United States Marine Corps, where he accumulated an additional 20-plus years of experience working with C4I systems and joint operations. He commanded various sized units and was the operations officer for Yuma-based HAWK battalion in Operation Desert Shield and Operation Desert Storm. He also served as Commanding Officer of Yuma-based MACS-7 and subsequently MACS-1, both here in Yuma. He retired as a lieutenant colonel.
"We have what we were looking for in an acting administrator: an accomplished individual who has high knowledge of the City organization, an understanding of the tough times we're in and a proven track record of producing results that have caused the world to take notice of Yuma, Arizona," said Mayor Al Krieger.
Krieger and the Council will continue their search for a fixed successor to Mark Watson, who served as administrator for five-plus years but whose letter of resignation was accepted by the Council at its March 3 meeting. As outlined at the March 16 worksession by Director of Human Resources Jack Dodd, this process is likely to take 6 months or longer.
Wilkinson's work with the Yuma Regional Communications System has been extensive, and the results have earned high acclaim. As both project manager and a council member for the YRCS, he also served on the Arizona statewide governance committee, which outlined the draft governing documents for Arizona's radio system. Wilkinson was appointed by the governor to the Southern Region Homeland Security Advisory Council, where he has served as chairperson for the last several years.
The YRCS team that Wilkinson was on was named Technical Team of the Year in 2008 by Arizona APCO. But that acclaim went international when the W2I Wireless Internet Institute awarded the team for community team building, when Yuma's competition included large international cities such as Seoul, South Korea and entire nations, such as the country of Macedonia.
This past year, Wilkinson's team was named the best Homeland Security Project for 2009 from Government Security News, tying with the New York Police Department.
