Purcell elected mayor of Houston

HOUSTON — At least to hear him tell it, Houston’s new mayor wasted no time getting down to business.

The city council elected Purcell from among its ranks to serve as mayor Monday. At the same meeting they chose as deputy mayor recently elected councilman Lance Wilson.

Purcell said Wednesday that earlier in the afternoon he held a meeting to outline his goals, expectations and priorities to the city’s various department heads. He also gave them six weeks to come up with long range plans for their departments.

On Tuesday, his first day on the job, Purcell said he implemented a plan to revamp the city’s system for plowing roads. Road plowing is a perennial issue in Houston but Tuesday, Purcell said, he had extra motivation.

“I took over right in the middle of a snowstorm,” he said.

But, Purcell said, he’s confident the major roads and arteries for which the city is responsible can be cleared in four hours, so long as everything goes according to plan.

“As long as everybody wakes up at 4 o’clock in the morning and if not, I told them, I’ll be up at 4 o’clock in the morning on my cell phone,” and, if that fails, he said, “I’ll have my tail inside a city vehicle plowing the snow.”

Other priorities, he said, are to get together a comprehensive list of projects for which the city will seek state and federal funding and give city department heads more of a leadership role in their various departments.

“Previous mayors didn’t rely on their department heads enough,” he said.