Crain’s 40 UNDER 40
ALEXIS WILEY, 34
Chief of Staff, Mayor's Office, City of Detroit
Alexis Wiley came to Detroit as a reporter climbing the television news ladder.
As a reporter/anchor at Fox 2 Detroit/WJBK Channel 2, the Los Angeles native started an occasional segment called "Redefining Detroit" about average city residents making small strides in improving their neighborhoods despite dysfunction in city government.
The segment was getting noticed by viewers and by late 2013 Wiley was considering whether to make her next move in the TV news business to a bigger city. But then she got a call on her cell phone from Mike Duggan, the former Detroit Medical Center CEO who had just won an improbable campaign for mayor after mounting a write-in campaign in the primary.
Duggan wanted Wiley to become his communications director in the midst of Detroit's historic bankruptcy, while the city was still under state-controlled emergency management.
Wiley, 34, viewed the job opportunity as an extension of her community-focused journalism.
"It's not everyday you get an opportunity to do something like this," Wiley said. "And I felt like I had spent years talking about what everybody else should be doing. I wanted to see if maybe I could be part of it."
After four months on the job, Duggan promoted her to chief of staff.
"She was problem-solving departmental problems that she was dealing with because we'd get a phone call from a reporter," Duggan said in an interview. "She would not only figure out how to answer the questions, she actually started digging in to solve the problems of the departments."
Wiley has taken a lead role helping Detroiters get assistance for their water bills and implemented the first citywide expansion of the Grow Detroit's Young Talent youth summer job program.
"The benefit of coming to this job from journalism is I think about how my actions impact people," Wiley said. "Because as reporters ... your job is to channel what people are feeling and kind of give voice to it. That has been an advantage to me in this job."
Duggan said Wiley has been "tenacious" in getting things done. He noted a deal she struck with Detroit Public Schools Community District to open 27 city recreation centers this summer.
"(Alexis) has a rare combination of public messaging talent and attention to detail," Duggan said. "You just don't find that in people very often. Those are two different skill sets."