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Antonio L. Jones of Largo, co-owner of a management training and consulting business, has been nominated to succeed Juanita Miller as one of three Prince George's representatives on the six-member Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission governing board.

Prince George's County Executive Jack B. Johnson (D) named Jones, who manages his company P3 Consulting, in a letter to County Council members dated June 22.

An outspoken advocate for minority contracting, promotion and hiring at the agency, Miller was viewed as a divisive force on the board and an obstacle to ending an almost 16-month search for a new general manager at the utility, which provides water and sewer services to 1.8 million customers in Montgomery and Prince George's counties.

Just last week, the commission tentatively agreed to hire D.C. Water and Sewer Authority General Manager Jerry N. Johnson, pending the completion of a background check and salary negotiations.

The selection of Johnson set off alarms among some consumer safety groups and activists in Washington, where a parent has filed a class action suit against D.C. WASA accusing the utility and its leaders of allowing children and others to be poisoned by high levels of lead in the city's water from 2001 to 2004 and covering up the threat.

"If the WSSC thinks they can go ahead and hire this guy and none of the public is going to be outraged, they're sorely mistaken," said lawyer Katherine Funk of Bethesda, who lived on Capitol Hill and gave birth to a daughter when lead levels were high.

"Part of the reason that WASA was finally held accountable for their actions is because the parents got mad. If Jerry Johnson thinks Washington, D.C., parents are a force to be reckoned with, wait until he has to deal with Montgomery County parents."

In defending Johnson as the choice of the two county executives, John Erzen, a Prince George's County spokesman, noted that the WSSC has not recorded high lead levels in its water, and staff of Montgomery County Executive Isiah Leggett (D) suggested that the Army Corps of Engineers, which supplies WASA's water, was to blame.  

Montgomery council President Phillip M. Andrews said council members have received a couple of e-mails with concerns over how the issue of lead in the D.C. water was handled.

The issue to him, he said, was governance of the agency. With three members each from Montgomery and Prince George's counties, the commission often has deadlocked on decisions.

"I do think the governance has been a very serious problem," Andrews said.

Leggett gave Johnson a hearty endorsement, in part because he had worked with his aide, Timothy Firestine.