Matthew Cordaro

One of the candidates for President of Memphis Light, Gas & Water is a gentleman named Matthew Charles Cordaro. His resume mentions that he was President of Nashville Electric Service from 1993 to 1999. I did some checking around at the Tennessean's website, but came up dry except for this story about his stepping down:

Under his watch, NES updated its emergency response plan, replaced an antiquated customer service phone system, moved to 24-hour, seven-day-a-week customer service and streamlined its payroll.

Good news there. MLG&W's customer service has fallen of late. Also:

He has been criticized by the union of rank-and-file NES employees for generous pay packages he arranged for senior management and for other missteps: He once had NES pay $3,000 to have a speech written for him.

Cordaro now makes $186,600 per year, one of the highest salaries in Metro government.

Bad. Very, very bad. What kind of salary will they offer him to come here? And will Ricky Peete try to get Herenton's salary raised to beat it? Again?

There was another disturbing note in this second article, about Cordaro's resignation:

Charles Cook, Nashville Electric Power Board chairman, said he was surprised by the news and that he received notification of Cordaro's departure only yesterday.

If he finds Memphis politics to be unpalatable, will he just drop us and leave Rev. Netters and the MLG&W Board holding the bad?

Googling turned up some stuff worth mentioning. His current gig at Long Island University came with this press release.

And another man up for the MLG&W position is current senior VP and COO William Thompson. Thompson applied for Cordaro's old position at NES when Cordaro left in 1999. Small world!