Obama Names Sims to No. 2 Position at HUD

President Barack Obama has nominated the county executive of King County, Wash., Ron Sims, to be the deputy secretary and second in command at the Department of Housing and Urban Development. If approved by the U.S. Senate, Mr. Sims will be in charge of the department's day-to-day operations. Mr. Sims has a "track record as an innovative leader," said HUD secretary Shaun Donovan. "His experience at the helm of a large urban government provides critical perspectives and his collaborative approach to problem solving has prepared him to effectively lead HUD's operations as the agency charts a new aggressive course," Mr. Donovan said. In his own statement on accepting the nomination, Mr. Sims referred to an op-ed piece he wrote for the Seattle Times last year. "I lamented that decades of misguided policies at the federal, state and local level have contributed to the problem; policies that have isolated the poorest urban neighborhoods from economic opportunities, and disenfranchised communities trying to do better. I said then, and I believe now that 'we all need to own the reality of inequity' and we need empowered community voices to partner with government in shaping decisions to attack inequities at their sources and solve them," he said.