As one of Colorado’s longest-serving — and highest-paid — public officials, Cal Marsella has guided a public transit system that is the envy of many across the country, but he also became a lightning rod for agency critics.
At the close of his 14-year tenure, Marsella has had to answer for financial difficulties with RTD’s FasTracks program, recent problems with its access-a-Ride bus service for the disabled, and the restiveness of a union-represented workforce that wants raises at a time the agency’s operating budget is running a deficit.
Marsella’s announcement Tuesday that he will step down July 31 to join MV Transportation Inc., a California company that provides private transit services to public entities, raises huge challenges for the Regional Transportation District’s board of directors.
Board chairman Lee Kemp said the directors will conduct a national search for Marsella’s successor and hope to have that person in place within six months.
Marsella acknowledged that the $6.9 billion FasTracks expansion is “the most ambitious construction program in the country” among transit agencies, but he said he is not leaving RTD in a bind as it works to solve the project’s financial difficulties.
“Good organizations are deep enough where vacuums are not created. There are probably eight people capable of stepping up,” he said, referring to the agency’s senior staff.
They include Phil Washington, assistant general manager for administration, and Bruce Abel, assistant general manager for customer and contracted services.
Kemp said the board will select an interim general manager from within the agency.
“There are many of us on the senior staff who would be honored to serve as interim general manager, if the board so chooses,” said Scott Reed, assistant general manager for public affairs. “There may be some who would like to be considered for the permanent position as well.
“It is way too early to speculate on how all that might play out, and it is clearly the board’s prerogative to make these decisions.”
Board members and other community leaders praised Marsella’s leadership.
“To the transit community he’s been the right man at the right time,” said RTD director Bill McMullen. “I expect we will see the cream of the crop apply for this position. We are a very desirable place to come and have a successful career.”
During Marsella’s tenure, said Denver Public Works Manager Bill Vidal, RTD added the Southeast and Southwest rail lines; the C line serving Auraria, Invesco Field and the Pepsi Center; and worked with the Colorado Department of Transportation to create high-occupancy toll lanes on Interstate 25 in which solo drivers can ride in bus and carpool lanes if they pay a toll.
“Cal took us from a car-dependent community to one that thinks multimodal,” Vidal said.
Marsella will leave RTD just when the board must decide whether to ask metro Denver voters to support another 0.4 percent sales-tax increase for FasTracks — a doubling of the existing tax.
Currently the agency says it is short $2.2 billion to build the project by 2017 as originally planned.
A decision by the board on whether to take the tax measure to voters this fall is expected in July or August, said Kemp.
Former Denver City Council member Susan Barnes-Gelt is one FasTracks observer who called recently for Marsella to step down.
“Cal’s skill set got us here, but it will take a very different package to finish,” Barnes-Gelt said Tuesday.
RTD should hire a general manager with “a track record in vertical development,” she said, referring to commercial development that some say must accompany the construction of new train lines.
Yet as a measure of how Marsella gets buffeted from all sides, only last week he answered critics of RTD’s sale of land near Union Station for commercial development, saying retail, residential and office development would help create 24-hour activity around the station and help ensure its success.
Recently, Marsella came under criticism from state Sen. Lois Tochtrop, D-Thornton, Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1001 and others for his compensation package.
In “a move of solidarity with the workforce,” Marsella said, he took a 3 percent cut in base salary this year, down to $295,299, and he accepted a similar reduction in his performance bonus, paring it to $27,577 from $36,286.
But that didn’t mollify Tochtrop, who said she was worried Marsella would receive a lucrative “golden parachute” as he leaves RTD.
Marsella’s employment contract with RTD calls for him to get 2 1/2 years of pension credit for each year worked. As of Feb. 28, Marsella also had accrued 1,010 hours of unused vacation and 939 hours of sick leave, both of which he can “cash out” upon leaving RTD.
“He will walk away with a big payout when he retires,” Tochtrop said. “And that’s taxpayer money. In the future we need to look at what is going on with all these retirement packages and performance pay.”
Jeffrey Leib: 303-954-1645 or jleib@denverpost.com
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Years that the Regional Transportation District was named best transit agency in North America by the American Public Transportation Association, 2003 and 2008
Cal Marsella’s legacy at RTD
June 22, 1995: Named Regional Transportation District general manager with a start date of Aug. 1 after unanimous approval from the district’s board. Marsella’s original salary was $107,500 annually.
April 26, 1996: A divided RTD board votes to accept $120 million in federal funds to complete its Southwest Corridor light- rail expansion.
July 14, 2000: RTD’s 8.7-mile, $177 million southwest light-rail line is launched.
July 26, 2001: RTD pays $49.75 million for its share of Denver’s Union Station in partnership with regional governmental bodies and associations.
April 5, 2002: RTD’s Central Platte Valley light-rail line, the C Line, debuts.
Nov. 2, 2004: Metro Denver voters approve RTD’s FasTracks transit tax for $4.7 billion in transit improvements over 12 years. The plan calls for new and extended rail lines throughout metro Denver.
April 3-7, 2006: RTD drivers and mechanics strike over wage and benefits issues, the first transit strike in metro Denver in 24 years.
Nov. 20, 2006: Regular service begins on the southeast light-rail line. The 19-mile line cost $880 million and took five years to construct.
Jan. 16, 2009: RTD obtains $308 million commitment from the Federal Transit Administration to complete the west light-rail line to Golden.
Tuesday: RTD announces that Marsella will resign, effective July 31. His current contract pays him $295,299 annually.
Compiled by Barry Osborne, The Denver Post
