Category: 
Job


Location: Savannah, GA

Chief of Planning and Economic Development

Salary: $165,000.00 - $199,000.00 Annually

Closing: 2/18/2024

Purpose
Are you an experienced planning and economic development professional with a strategic mindset? Do you have the expertise and experience to support innovative planning and economic development efforts for a growing city with metropolitan needs? The City of Savannah, Georgia, seeks a proactive and creative collaborator for a new and pivotal position, Chief of Planning and Economic Development (Chief).

As part of Savannah’s executive realignment, the first Chief of Planning and Economic Development is charged with expanding the city’s tax base, shaping development and tourism, creating economic opportunities, preserving protected historic landmarks, and ensuring sustainability. This Chief will join a city committed to enhancing and sustaining its residents' quality of life and well-being through these efforts while implementing smart growth initiatives and shaping development to meet the needs of the entire community. The Chief will also help to address critical community challenges such as affordable housing.

Reporting directly to the City’s chief executive officer, the City Manager, the Chief of Planning and Economic Development serves as an executive manager and successfully collaborates with various internal and external entities, including the Savannah Economic Development Authority, the Metropolitan Planning Commission and MPO, local chambers of commerce and other industry partners, state and federal agencies, and others to proactively address the city's planning and economic development needs.

Key Position Priorities

  • With thorough community and organizational immersion, research, and evaluation,
    • Develop an actionable plan to manage Savannah’s unprecedented growth that advances commerce and fosters greater connectivity, appropriate housing density, upward mobility, historic preservation, and sustainability.
    • Identify and develop actionable plans to better address poverty and provide more effective on ramps for economic stability and independence for lower-income residents.
    • Identify and address the current and future needs of the city and develop innovative and sustainable approaches that consider and address human design and economic development/impacts; and,
    • Develop regionally focused strategic plans and priorities integrating social justice with economic development, transportation, mobility and transportation services, and sustainability.
  • Facilitate conversations and initiate opportunities for real estate development and redevelopment - investigating and strategizing methods for financing, leasing, and selling real estate and exploring opportunities within historic districts for redevelopment and preservation to ensure sustainability and financial gain.
  • Identify and implement strategies to improve and support effective development permitting and reviews, improve transit and multimodal transportation planning and implementation, as well as lead the City’s Vision Zero initiative.
  • Serve as the chief advisor to the City Manager on all matters of planning, land use, and economic development.

Minimum Qualifications
Bachelor's degree (master’s degree preferred) in Public Administration, Business Administration, Planning, Engineering, or Economic Development supplemented with ten (10) years of responsible management experience in a public agency is required, or an equivalent combination of education and experience.

Successful Candidate

  • Extensively knowledgeable of economic development, comprehensive planning, real estate development, historic preservation, permitting, zoning rules and regulations, land use, sign codes, affordable housing, and other critical planning competencies;
  • Knowledgeable of the activities of the departmental functional areas: Development Services, Planning & Urban Design, Economic Development, Parking Services, Transportation, Special Events, Film & Tourism, and Environmental Services & Sustainability;
  • Skilled in applying principles of management, supervision, budgeting, governmental finance, and personnel principles and practices;
  • Skilled in solving complex problems, seeking goal-oriented win-win outcomes, advising on technical matters, and utilizing advanced mathematical operations, methods, and complex variables in real estate and economic development processes;
  • Excellent written, verbal and visual communication skills; adept in writing business plans, memoranda, policy recommendations, etc.; adept in presentation skills and demonstrates an understanding of the process of developing and approving such communication materials
  • Experienced with meaningful and authentic community engagement, collaboration and partnership.
  • Experienced in long-range planning, ordinance development, and implementing comprehensive plans;
  • Effective in interpersonal, and presentation competencies to effectively engage clients, community members and groups, staff, and city leadership;
  • A highly effective decision-maker who exercises substantial discretion in the decision-making and conflict-resolution process and effectively engages and communicates with all necessary staff and stakeholders in the process;
  • An empowering manager dedicated to retaining and enhancing a cohesive culture and supporting the development of individual employees; and,
  • A leader who values accountability while holding realistic and fair expectations of self and others.

How to Apply
To apply, please visit https://www.governmentjobs.com/careers/developmentalassociates and click on the Chief of Planning and Economic Development – City of Savannah, GA title.