Anchorage relabels a top job, Falsey named city manager

Bill Falsey has a new title running much of Anchorage's government, though not an unfamiliar job. Falsey became municipal manager Monday — the post overseeing police, fire, health, the port, the airport, and the city's utilities — stepping up from chief administrative officer, the role he's held in Mayor Suzanne LaFrance's administration all along.

In practice it's a relabeling more than a shakeup. Falsey has spent the past year running the city's internal operations — finance, HR, IT, purchasing, including a rewrite of the purchasing code — and much of that is now in place. So the administration is dissolving the CAO post, folding its duties into the manager's office, and adjusting a couple of reporting lines: finance will now report directly to the mayor, while HR, IT, and purchasing stay under Falsey.

He's run this same office once before, in the Berkowitz administration, so little about the work is new to him.

At a recent Assembly session, Falsey described the manager's role as part "nerve center," making sure "the hive mind knows what the hive mind is doing," and part "helping to steer the ship."