John Rhea, the much-maligned NYCHA chairman, resigned Monday, ending a rocky four-year tenure that saw living conditions deteriorate dramatically for public housing residents.
Sources told the Daily News that Rhea submitted his resignation to Mayor Bloomberg, who in 2009 appointed him to run the authority despite the Wall Street financial adviser’s lack of public housing experience.
Sources told The News that Rhea has designated Kyle Kimball, the departing city Economic Development Corp. director, to be temporary chairman.
The sudden regime change comes as Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio has vowed to dismiss Rhea, whose tenure came under fire last year after a Daily News exposé of mismanagement and neglect at the housing authority.
Rhea – who recently told The News his time at NYCHA was “great” – presided over the authority as its backlog of apartment repair requests rose to a jaw-dropping 420,000.
The News revealed that during Rhea’s run, the Housing Authority for years sat on $45 million in city funds meant to install much-needed security cameras in crime-ridden developments, and delayed spending nearly $1 billion on federal funds to fix up deteriorating projects.
Bloomberg and NYCHA officials declined to comment Monday, but sources told The News that an emergency meeting of the NYCHA board was scheduled for Tuesday afternoon – hours before Bloomberg was scheduled to leave office.
