Auerbach Goes State-Wide

Published Mar 05 2007, 10:41 PM by David S. Bernstein

My only question here is what took so long. Over here we had John Auerbach, longtime executive director of the Boston Public Health Commission... and over there was this open position for Deval Patrick to fill as Public Health Commissioner. No-brainer, I'd say. Several others have speculated to me that Auerbach would be a great appointment. Now, apparently it's done.

I like Auerbach, so I think this is a good hire for Patrick and his Health and Human Services secretary, JudyAnn Bigby -- and a loss for Boston, of course. Fortunately, I think there are a lot of good people out there, and this should be a relatively easy spot for Menino to fill.