901 Bagby: Inside The Mayor's Office

Marta Crinejo has been the gatekeeper for every vote on Houston City Council for 14 years — and the first thing she did when she met Mayor Whitmire was refuse a direct order. He told her she should just agree with him. She said no. She immediately assumed she'd fired herself. She hadn't. He was testing her. And having fun. Marta is the City of Houston's Agenda Director, a role she's held across five mayors after walking into Mayor Annise Parker's office and saying three words: "I want ...

Houston's Housing & Community Development Director opens this episode with a correction most people have never heard: when the federal government approved $314 million in disaster relief, no check arrived. The city earns that money by spending it correctly first — reimbursement is conditional, not guaranteed. That single clarification reframes everything Michael C. Nichols, Director of the City of Houston Housing and Community Development Department, goes on to explain. Nichols walks Owen...

When Mayor Whitmire's FY2027 budget passed City Council 15 to 1, the headlines went to solid waste fees and right-of-way restructuring. Melissa Dubowski, Houston's Director of Finance, says the more important story got almost no coverage: the Mayor quietly froze city employee healthcare costs flat — in a year when healthcare expenses were rising everywhere else. In this conversation with Owen Conflenti, Dubowski traces her path from a biomedical engineering degree at Boston University to the ...

Houston’s Presiding Municipal Court Judge emphasizes that the Municipal Court is truly the people’s court. She is committed to ensuring the public receives an excellent customer service experience while resolving their court matters. Her staff is dedicated to being welcoming and helpful to everyone navigating the court system. Director & Presiding Judge Nelly Treviño Santos runs the court most Houstonians will actually encounter — Class C misdemeanors, traffic citations, and city o...

Dr. Theresa Tran got the call about leading Houston's Health Department while she was pregnant. Baby Teddy was born July 24th. Her predecessor's last day was August 30th. There was no maternity leave — just one month to learn a 1,000-person department from scratch. In this conversation with host Owen Conflenti, Dr. Tran lays out what the Houston Health Department actually does — and the answer is bigger than almost any Houstonian realizes. On the public side: 12 neighborhood multi-service ce...