Between his boyish looks and his early start in politics, critics once looked upon Mike Johnston as the proverbial young man in a hurry.

But now 49 years old and Denver’s mayor, Johnston no longer seems all that young.

Given his slow and meandering pace in picking the key people needed to run Denver City Hall – he doesn’t seem to be in much of a hurry, either.

An enlightening news report by The Gazette this week puts it in perspective.

It took Johnston nearly five months since assuming office last summer to name the heads of his Public Safety Department and of the city’s police force.

Not after finding them through a national search – but by walking down the hall to the offices where they already worked, and extending their contracts. He reappointed Public Safety Executive Director Armando Saldate and Police Chief Ron Thomas to their posts.

As The Gazette report also notes, Johnston still needs to pick leaders for the sheriff’s and fire departments.

The delay in naming police and public safety chiefs has been especially frustrating because the public expected the mayor it elected last June to hit the ground running with a plan – and people in place – to tackle Denver’s spiraling crime.

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The president of the Denver Police Protective Association told The Gazette’s news staff the process for deciding on a chief took too long – that the lack of a permanent police chief began to affect the department’s operational decisions like setting priorities.

Dithering over a new police chief and the other public safety posts couldn’t have come at a worse time. Denver has been battered by homicides and other violence as well as theft – particularly auto theft. Even the mayor’s car was stolen. Denver has been fighting an overdose epidemic, as well.

Yet, it’s unclear if the Johnston administration isn’t taking the crime fight seriously enough – or the new mayor himself simply has trouble setting priorities and sticking to them.

Perhaps, it has been too easy for his administration to get caught up in the pomp and promotion of a bold, if unfocused, new vision after 12 years of a previous mayor in office. A mark of that has been Johnston’s penchant for promising, then fumbling, surveys and committees intended to sound out the city’s staff as well as the general public.

Such efforts, criticized by some as eyewash, seem to have served more to distract and sidetrack than to advance a discernible agenda. That also seems to be the case in areas of city government besides public safety.

For example, The Gazette reports that Johnston picked someone who wasn’t on any of the lists of finalists forwarded by a vetting committee to lead the city’s arts and venues department.

Shortly after Johnston’s inauguration in July, we urged the new mayor to cull wheat from chaff. We also noted here that his inauguration speech seemed grandiose enough – and broad enough – to suffice for the inauguration of just about any elected office, which wasn’t encouraging.

It sounded a lot then like he had his eye on too many prizes – and that still may be the case. Even if he no longer is a young man in a hurry, after all, he remains by all accounts ambitious.

Denver’s mayor isn’t a ceremonial post, nor is it just another seat on the City Council. Johnston’s duty is to serve as the actual, hands-on, day-to-day CEO of municipal government.

That means he has to focus, prioritize – and keep moving forward.

Denver Gazette Editorial Board