Deputy Permanent Secretary & Director General Corporate Performance
Biography
Carolyn Downs has been Chief Executive of Shropshire County Council for five years. She has worked for Shropshire County Council since 1999. Previously, she was a Corporate Director with the county council with responsibilities including environmental services. She started working in local government in the Library Service in 1982 at the London Borough of Haringey and stayed there for seven years, finally working on Inner City Regeneration Programmes. She moved back into Leisure Services as an Assistant Director in Stevenage Borough and then as Director of Leisure Services in Calderdale Metropolitan Borough Council from 1996 to 1999.
Since Carolyn became Chief Executive of Shropshire, it has become the highest performing county council and one of the top ten councils in the country; it is rated as four star and is improving strongly. It is also a Beacon Council for older people's services, climate change and early intervention for children.
Carolyn is a member of the Lifting the Burdens Task Force appointed by Ruth Kelly and was an external review team member for the Capability Review of Defra (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs).