Linda K. Argo was appointed by Mayor Adrian Fenty as Director of the Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs (DCRA), in June, 2007. She served in interim and acting director capacities from April until September, 2007 when she was confirmed by the DC Council.
For two years before that, Argo served as DCRA’s deputy director, responsible for the agency’s public service enhancements. Her office radically overhauled the way DCRA delivers information and services to the public, coordinated complex multi-agency inspection actions, provided up-to-date information and increased the number of services on the web and met regularly with business and industry partners.
- As agency director, Argo has been responsible for major initiatives to enhance service delivery. Under her leadership, DCRA has:
- Eliminated previous and longstanding backlogs in the processing of building permits; increased percentage of plans reviewed within target timeframes to 92 percent;
- launched a new Permit Center, where customers now move with ease from station to station as they meet–face-to-face–with plan reviewers and engineers;
- introduced online postcard and supplemental permits for homeowners and contractors with a limited scope of work;
- overhauled the inspections program, including requiring International Code Council (ICC) training and certification for over 70 residential and commercial inspectors;
- established a new General Business License and General Contractor License, expected to apply to approximately 12,000 businesses that currently have no other license requirements in the District; and
- successfully launched the first phase of the agency’s Comprehensive Property Management System for inspections, permitting and enforcement, integrating over 50 individual databases into a single, enterprise system.
Argo has over 30 years of management experience, the last nine of which have included managing major innovations in District government service delivery. She served as the chief of staff and public information officer at the Office of the Chief Technology Officer (OCTO) for nearly six years.
Before joining the District government, Argo was senior vice president of corporate relations and administration for the College Construction Loan Insurance Association where she managed communications, marketing and government relations. Earlier positions included a stint at the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities, as executive director for education finance and director of business development at the Student Loan Marketing Association (Sallie Mae).
Argo graduated with honors from the University of California at Santa Barbara and has a master’s degree from the University of Southern California. In 2005, she completed the Executive Education Certificate Program, Strategic Management of Regulatory and Enforcement Agencies, at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
She lives in the District, with her husband, David.
