State sideShake-up at the top of New York State's homeland security office

Published 21 July 2008

David Sheppard, acting director of New York State Office of Homeland Security who was appointed by former governor George Pataki, resigned last week, signaling further consolidation of power by Michael Balboni, the state’s homeland security czar

Interesting developments in the New York State’s homeland security department. Last Wednesday the office was surprised by the sudden departure of its longtime acting director, F. David Sheppard, after a confrontation with top officials of the Paterson administration. Albany Times Union’s Rick Karlin writes that the immediate issue was said to be Sheppard’s job title and whether he had been required to get Senate confirmation, but tensions between him and Michael Balboni, the state’s homeland security czar, had been brewing for some time, according to insiders who declined to be named since they weren’t authorized to speak on the matter. Some members of the approximately 120-person Office of Homeland Security (OHS) said the resignation was prompted either by Balboni’s desire to assert himself and possibly put his or Paterson’s own people into the agency’s leadership, or by resistance to Sheppard’s military management style. Sheppard, who was appointed by former governor George Pataki in 2006, was a decorated combat helicopter pilot who served in Vietnam and is now a brigadier general with the Army National Guard. He previously ran OHS’s Weapons of Mass Destruction Task Force, and helped helped coordinate the Guard’s response to the 9/11 World Trade Center attack and helped oversee security for the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York City.

Karlin writes that Sheppard has been credited with bringing millions of dollars of federal funding into the state and has drawn praise for his get-it-done attitude. Others, though, said Sheppard never really reconciled himself to taking directions from Balboni, a former Long Island Republican senator who former governor Eliot Spitzer, a Democrat, appointed as deputy secretary for public safety in January 2007. “Sheppard never got used to second floor oversight,” one insider told Karlin, referring to the governor’s office. After he was appointed deputy secretary, Balboni put some of his top Senate staffers in at OHS. Karlin reports that OHS was said to have suffered from what one insider described as a “poisonous atmosphere” lately. Some said other officials who Sheppard brought over from the military may be on the way out as well. The immediate source of the recent tensions was the realization by the Paterson administration that Sheppard, while he had been referred to in documents as the agency’s director, was actually the acting director, since he had never been confirmed by the Senate. An added dilemma stemmed from the fact that as acting director, Sheppard earned $168,471 but the permanent job paid $136,000, according to state records. Sheppard was said to have wanted the permanent post, but, according to Senate records, his name was never sent over for confirmation.

As deputy secretary for public safety, Balboni oversees the Division of Criminal Justice Services, which includes State Police, the Department of Correctional Services, and State Emergency Management Office.