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Published on: 5/8/2009
Last Visited: 5/11/2009
Charlie Johnson > Former Utahn will return home in June
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Official photo of Sandy resident, Charlie Johnson, who currently serves as Assistant Secretary and Chief Financial Officer of the United States Department of Health and Human Services.
Permission to use photo given by Charlie Johnson
Washington > When Utah-native Charlie Johnson became the acting secretary at Health and Human Services, his co-workers created an office pool to bet on how long he would hold the temporary post.
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Johnson came to Washington to work for his long-time friend and former Utah Gov.
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Johnson was the chief financial officer at HHS through the end of the Bush term.
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Johnson sided with many of his colleagues and expected to hold the title for a very short period of time.
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That ended Johnson's 99 day run as the head honcho at HHS.
As the acting secretary, Johnson mainly served administrative responsibilities.
He signed personnel documents and he extended the comment period on proposed regulations.
But the swine flu changed some things.
He signed the document declaring a public health emergency, participated in daily flu updates and coordinated with international leaders on how to react to the virus, which has turned out to be much less deadly than some initially feared.
Johnson said he was "quite pleased" to see the pandemic flu playbook that Leavitt spearheaded deployed as planned.
He's not done at HHS just yet.
Johnson, a former chairman of Utah's Board of Regents, is working on securing a new billing system for the department's program support center for the end of the month.
It is an arrangement Leavitt worked out with then-nominee Daschle to help Johnson obtain federal health insurance.
Political appointees must serve five years to gain the benefit, but because of a paperwork mistake, Johnson needed to stay on an extra four months to meet the eligibility rule.