Austin, Texas, fires City Manager Spencer Cronk
Austin’s city manager was fired Wednesday after outrage over a slow and fumbling response to a winter storm power outage that left thousands of people in the Texas capital without power for a week or more.
The Austin City Council’s 10-1 vote to sack Spencer Cronk, the city’s top manager, followed growing calls for accountability after an ice storm this month disrupted power to more than 170,000 customers. Frustration boiled in the nation’s 11th-largest city as Austin officials gave few updates about the widespread outages for days and gave no assurances about how long repairs would take.
Cronk, who has been in office since 2018, was the first city executive to lose his job because of the ongoing outages. He will receive a settlement of approximately $463,000.
He has not publicly dug in and fought for his job as his fall seemed increasingly likely and said on Wednesday he was proud of his achievements.
“I serve at the discretion of the mayor and council and honor their decision,” Cronk said in a statement released by the city.
The ice storm downed trees and power lines in the city of more than 1 million people, causing outages and damage on a scale that Austin officials likened to a hurricane or tornado. Slow restoration efforts left thousands of people grappling with school closures, malfunctioning traffic lights, and the financial pinch of spoiled food and hotel bills. Although most of Austin never lost power, at the peak of the outages nearly 1 in 3 homes and businesses were without power.
Austin’s power was not fully restored until nearly two weeks after the outages began.
Cronk previously apologized for “any shortcomings in our response” and had promised the city would make changes to better respond to future disasters. For now, his job will be filled by Jesús Garza, who previously served as Austin City Manager and was appointed by the council to temporarily replace Cronk.
Austin Mayor Kirk Watson, a Democrat who took office in January, has instigated rallies that have put Cronk’s job in jeopardy. In Austin, the city manager is appointed by the mayor and city council and acts like the CEO of a company.
Austin Energy, the city’s electric utility, brought in additional utility teams from across Texas to help deal with the large number of outages.
For thousands of Austin residents, it was the second time in three years that a February winter storm cut power for days. Though the catastrophic Texas power outages of 2021 were the result of another outage — an ice storm that brought the state’s power grid to the brink of collapse — the other reason was of little comfort to Austin residents.
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