BALTIMORE (AP) - Baltimore Mayor Bernard “Jack” Young has fired the city’s housing commissioner.
In a statement Friday evening, The Baltimore Sun reports that Michael Braverman said his termination from the Department of Housing and Community Development “came as a complete surprise.”
Asked why he was fired, Braverman told the newspaper he was told only that “they want to go in a different direction.”
Braverman spent more than three decades working in Baltimore. He worked his way up to commissioner. Braverman’s annual salary, according to a 2019 city database, was about $200,000.
His departure represents additional upheaval at the top levels of Young’s administration. Since he was defeated in the June Democratic primary, Young’s chief spokesman and deputy chief of staff for operations have resigned.
Antonia Fasanelli, director of the Homeless Persons Representation Project, said she was on a conference call with Braverman Friday morning to discuss how to prevent families from falling into homelessness.
“Baltimore, like every community across the country, is facing an impending crisis of mass homelessness,” Fasanelli said. “To lose the housing commissioner, who was the primary person in Baltimore responding to that potential, is really concerning.”
James Bentley, Young’s spokesman, said Braverman’s deputy, Alice Kennedy, has taken over his role on an acting basis.
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