Gov. Christine Gregoire is expected to tap a Utah administrator today to run the massive Department of Social and Health Services (DSHS), widely considered the toughest job in Washington state government.

Robin Arnold-Williams, the 48-year-old former director of Utah's Department of Human Services, was picked over several other out-of-state candidates to lead Washington state's largest agency.

Arnold-Williams was introduced to key lawmakers last night and her appointment will be announced at a news conference this morning, according to two sources familiar with the selection. Gregoire's office declined to confirm or deny the report, and Arnold-Williams could not be reached last night.

She would replace Dennis Braddock, a former state lawmaker who served 4 ½ years as secretary of DSHS, longer than any predecessor.

The $7.9-billion-a-year, 17,700-employee agency is frequently a target for lawmakers, in part because of its size. It encompasses Medicaid, mental-health and developmental-disabilities services, nursing-home oversight, welfare, child-abuse investigations, foster care and juvenile detention.

Arnold-Williams ran Utah's version of DSHS for eight years under two governors, including Mike Leavitt, who was appointed last year to head the federal Health and Human Services Department. She stepped down in January.

"She's really one of the superstars in our industry," Jerry Friedman, executive director of the American Public Human Services Association, told The Salt Lake Tribune earlier this year.

Arnold-Williams helped Leavitt shepherd through changes in Utah's Medicaid system, which expanded coverage to 25,000 uninsured residents but also cut dental, vision and mental-health benefits. Leavitt hopes to make Utah a template for reform nationally.

She also oversaw Utah's child-welfare system after Leavitt settled a lawsuit that accused the state of such mismanagement that it violated the constitutional rights of foster children.

During Arnold-Williams' tenure, the state vigorously fought court-ordered reforms and is still out of compliance, said Bill Grimm, a lawyer with the nonprofit National Center for Youth Law, which filed the suit.

Last year, the center negotiated an out-of-court settlement with Washington state in a similar lawsuit. Arnold-Williams' appointment does not bode well for changes in Washington, Grimm said.

"Utah has not been a leader in child welfare but has drug its feet on reforms it promised a decade ago," he said. "It really is a mystery if the governor [Gregoire] is concerned about child welfare that she'd reach out to the child-welfare system in Utah."

Gregoire lists child-welfare change as a top priority. She hired the Massachusetts-based executive search firm Ford Webb to scour the country for candidates.

Arnold-Williams, a Michigan native, moved to Utah in 1978 to ski and attend college and spent 24 years in Utah state government. She lives in the ski mecca of Park City with her husband.

Braddock, a health-insurance executive before his appointment by Gov. Gary Locke in 2000, has not disclosed his plans. In a farewell e-mail to employees March 1, he described his job as "a tumultuous love affair with hopes, dreams, tragedy and disappointment rolled into every day's activity. I will miss the affair."

Material from The Salt Lake Tribune was used in this report.

Jonathan Martin: 206-464-2605 or jmartin@seattletimes.com