D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser on Friday announced her picks to head the new city agencies that will replace the Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs, which was broken up by the D.C. Council over years-long concerns that it was too big and failed to do its many jobs well.

But in showing that she’s not looking to dramatically shake things up, Bowser nominated DCRA’s existing director Ernest Chrappah to lead the new Department of Buildings, which will be charged with issuing building permits, monitoring for illegal construction, and conducting housing inspections.

Bowser also nominated DCRA’s deputy director, Shirley Kwan-Hui, to serve as in the interim director of the Department of Licensing and Consumer Protection, which which will issue business and occupational licenses and enforce the city’s consumer protection laws.

The nominations come only hours before the agency breakup — one of the bigger government reorganizations in years — is set to occur, as DCRA formally ceases to exist on Oct. 1, the start of the city’s 2023 fiscal year.

The breakup was forced by the D.C. Council, which passed a bill in late 2020 splitting the agency in two — and did so over Bowser’s opposition and veto. Proponents of the breakup, led by Council Chairman Phil Mendelson said DCRA was too large and responsible for too many things at once. Critics of the agency said it had a spotty record of protecting tenants from bad housing conditions and enforcing consumer protection laws. Bowser, on the other hand, said the breakup was unnecessary, costly, and would derail her efforts to improve DCRA.

The two new agencies combined will be bigger than what DCRA was in budget and staff. In 2022, DCRA had a budget of $90 million and 500 employees; the Department of Buildings will have a $68.7 million budget and 400 employees for 2023, the Department of Licensing and Consumer Protection will have a $37.7 million budget and 200 employees.

Chrappah, who took over DCRA during a particularly troubled time in late 2018, told DCist/WAMU in early August that he hopes the agency’s breakup will be smooth, and that most residents, builders, and businesses wouldn’t even notice much of a difference. But last week he conceded to the council that there may still be hiccups to come: the Department of Buildings will come into being with only 285 of of its 379 positions filled, which Chrappah said reflected the broader hiring challengers many employers face.

Housing advocates and long-time critics of DCRA have remained cautiously optimistic that the breakup will improve how the city regulates housing conditions and construction projects, but have also said that it will take time to determine whether anything substantial has changed in the new agency’s work cultures. At the council hearing last week, some said they hoped that Bowser would nominate new people to lead the two agencies, and not merely shuffle existing senior leadership around (which she seems to have chosen to do).

“We would like to see a change in leadership and to see someone take the position to prioritize inspection and code enforcement so that low-income tenants are better-served,” said Janet Phoenix, a research professor at George Washington University’s Milken Institute School of Public Health and the chair of the D.C. Asthma Coalition.

In an email to DCist/WAMU, Kathy Zeisel, a senior supervising attorney with the Children’s Law Center, said she was disappointed with Bowser’s picks, especially at the Department of Buildings.

“Children’s Law Center has been advocating for changes to DCRA for years. We are concerned the mayor’s nomination will not take the Department of Buildings in the new direction it needs to go. It’s critical the new agency is able increase its focus on housing code inspections and enforcement so that it can truly promote safe and healthy housing in the District,” she said.

That sentiment was largely echoed by Council Chairman Phil Mendelson, who sounded a note of frustration in a statement.

“The new Department of Buildings is a chance to be transformative. It’s an opportunity to bring in or promote a change agent. Simply moving over the head of the department’s dysfunctional predecessor-agency misses that chance,” he said. “Why does this matter? Because every tenant is harmed by the poor quality of housing code enforcement. Every homeowner is harmed by the illegal construction rampant in our city. And every developer, including non-profit affordable housing providers, is harmed by the cost of permit delays and mistakes.”

In his time in D.C. government, Chrappah has styled himself a digital transformer of troubled agencies. In 2016, he took over the Department of For-Hire Vehicles — which regulates taxicabs and and rideshare services like Uber. And he launched a similar digital transformation at DCRA, kicking off initiatives like on-demand housing inspections and a tool to allow residents to rate contractors, electricians, and architects. Chrappah also said last week that wait times for inspections have been cut from 15 to seven days during his tenure.

But critics say DCRA has still had its share of slip-ups during Chrappah’s term, including a number of missed opportunities to have prevented a house fire on Kennedy Street NW in 2019 that left two people dead — one of them a nine-year-old boy.

Chrappah and Kwan-Hui have operated in tandem since he took over the Department of For-Hire Vehicles. She later accompanied him over to DCRA when he was nominated to lead the agency.

Chrappah’s nomination as leader of the Department of Buildings will require council confirmation, but Kwan-Hui’s will not for the time being, as she will be serving as an interim director of the Department of Licensing and Consumer Protection. Bowser will soon have to nominate a permanent leader for the department, lest Kwan-Hui forego a salary. She can be paid only for six months as interim.