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OGDEN, Utah (AP) -- The city fired the director of the Local Redevelopment Agency at Business Depot Ogden and immediately hired his replacement.
City officials will not say why Gaylord Gardner, LRA director since June, was fired last week.
The action comes right on the heels of the Defense Department's subpoena of all records related to the transfer of land and property at Defense Depot Ogden to the city since its closure in 1997.
Mayor Matthew Godfrey said Gardner's firing had nothing to do with the subpoena.
Gardner could not be reached for comment Monday by the Standard-Examiner.
Gardner was hired by the city as a principal engineer for BDO in April 1998, and he became LRA director after Michael Pavich quit to take another job.
Gardner's last day on the job was March 16. City Project Coordinator Kevin Ireland, was interviewed and hired the following day, and began work the day after that.
"He was a targeted hire," Godfrey said. "Funding for Kevin (as senior project coordinator) runs out at the end of this year, and we were wringing our hands on how to keep him. He has great connections in the retail industry and a lot of experience leasing properties."
Ireland served as general manager for the Ogden City Mall from 1992 to 1998, when he left to manage Trolley Square in Salt Lake City.
Ireland left Trolley Square in January 2003 and was hired by Ogden last June.
As of late February, BDO had 61 tenants and more than 2,500 employees with the recent addition of Lofthouse Foods.
Since 2000, more than $35 million has been invested in replacement of utilities and infrastructure upgrades at BDO. One of Gardner's goals had been to reverse the perception of the area as a restricted military base and to blend it with the rest of the Ogden community.
(Copyright 2004 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
