The DC Housing Authority board of commissioners voted 7-2 Friday morning to authorize a two-year contract for Brenda Donald, the former chief of D.C.’s child welfare agency, to lead the city’s troubled public housing agency.

A close ally of Mayor Muriel Bowser, Donald was voted the agency’s interim director in late May — just weeks after she announced she was leaving the Child and Family Services agency and told staff she would “retire from public life.”

The search for a new executive director began when the Housing Authority board declined to renew the contract of former director Tyrone Garrett, who held the post for less than four years. Garrett, who often clashed with agency staff, left the Housing Authority having made little progress on a 30-year plan to renovate or rebuild nearly 3,000 public housing units that are close to being “uninhabitable” because of structural issues, pest infestations, and mold growth. Donald will oversee an agency that functions as a landlord to roughly 7,500 of the city’s most vulnerable families and is responsible for disbursing housing vouchers to thousands more.

“Over the last eight weeks I have really dug in … really listening and unearthing a lot of the long-standing issues at the agency. We’re building momentum,” Donald said in brief remarks at the beginning of Friday’s meeting. “I have identified and have a handle on some of the big issues [at play.]”

The vote to secure a longer contract for Donald came as a last-minute twist for public housing residents, who believed the board was preparing to hire a recruiting firm that would lead a national search for a new director with robust public housing experience. But on Wednesday, the board announced that it would hold an emergency hearing Friday morning to consider Donald for a two-year term — and gave the public just one day to sign up to testify.

Tenant leaders and advocates excoriated the board during public testimony on Friday for its sudden about-face, and for considering Donald — who by all accounts has no experience in property development or acquisition and no history managing housing programs — to lead an agency in financial distress that faces billions of dollars’ worth of maintenance issues and a workforce in turmoil.

“She fails to meet the top three job competencies listed in the board’s [job description]. She lacks knowledge of HUD programs, development expertise, and her resume shows no background in planning [or] property acquisition. … The core housing function of the agency is something with which she has no experience,” Patricia Fugere, executive director of the Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless, testified Friday. “It’s disrespectful not just to the residents but also to the candidate herself. We’re sending in an ophthalmologist to do open heart surgery on a dying patient.”

Commissioner Ann Hoffman, who vehemently lobbied the board to vote against Donald’s new contract, noted that Donald “has not submitted an application for the position, has not submitted a resume to the board or to the search committee, [and] has not submitted to the board her vision for the agency [or] her plans for the next two years.

“In fact, [Donald] has acknowledged publicly that she has no experience with real estate, which is the business of DCHA, and no experience with public housing,” Hoffman said. “The board is taking the word of the interim executive director that she can handle the job.”

At-Large Councilmember Elissa Silverman was the only member of the D.C. Council who testified against Donald’s contract extension, urging the board to table the vote until it conducted a national search for a more suitable candidate. At-Large Councilmember Anita Bonds, on the other hand, said she supported offering Donald a longer term. Regarding concerns about Donald’s lack of relevant experience, Bonds said: “That will come.”

Donald did not address the board or public about the opposition to her contract extension. She previously led D.C.’s Child and Family Services Agency during three separate stints, and garnered glowing praise from Bowser last year when she helped usher it out of a 30-year period of federal court oversight. In her brief time leading the Housing Authority, Donald ruffled feathers when she unsuccessfully lobbied the D.C. Council this summer to relax the Housing Authority board’s oversight powers; she pushed to raise the contracting amount that triggers board approval from $250,000 to $500,000.

Donald, who was criticized by CFSA employees and child welfare advocates after her staff allegedly encouraged employees to flout court orders, is known for her strict management skills and for leading a team of loyal employees who help execute her vision. That management experience likely ingratiated her to many members of the DC Housing Authority, which has been wracked with high turnover among entry- and senior-level staff alike, and is famous for its interpersonal disputes.

Board chairman Neil Albert, along with Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development John Falcicchio, praised Donald for her “problem solving” and “customer service.”

“I don’t see Brenda out there with a hammer and a saw,” Albert said. “But Brenda has the ability to recognize and attract real talented people to work for her, [evidenced by] her ability to turn around CFSA and bring it out of receivership.”

Other members of the board who weren’t appointed to the body by Bowser, like Aquarius Vann-Ghasri and Kenneth Council, swatted away assertions that only Bowser’s appointees support Donald’s tenure.

“I support Brenda [because of] her management. Two-year contract? Give it to her,” Vann-Ghasri said.

Donald faces a series of significant challenges as she prepares to permanently take charge of the Housing Authority and oversee Garrett’s 30-year transformation plan, which will involve the temporary displacement of thousands of the city’s lowest-income families.

It is unclear whether Donald plans on changing course, and what her long-term vision is for an agency that functions as a landlord for roughly 20,000 people.

This story has been updated to include a quote from Brenda Donald.