A special panel of civic leaders appointed by RTD’s board of directors has unanimously recommended that the agency hire a Vancouver, British Columbia, transit executive as its new general manager and chief executive, according to sources familiar with the search process.
Last week, the Regional Transportation District board named current agency interim general manager Phillip Washington, British Columbia Rapid Transit Co. president and CEO Douglas Kelsey and former top United Airlines executive Sean Donohue as the three finalists for RTD’s top post.
RTD directors are expected to select the agency’s new top executive as early as Tuesday from among the finalists. When the board set up the panel of civic leaders, directors said they would not be bound by the panel’s recommendation.
Cal Marsella, RTD’s long-time general manager and CEO, left the transit agency in July, and a special committee has conducted a national search over the past six months for Marsella’s successor.
More than 200 people applied for the job, and RTD’s board hired an executive search firm from the Washington area to help directors winnow the field.
The board allocated up to $100,000 for the search process, which included the possible recruitment of a second senior position — a special “FasTracks czar” whose job would be to lead the agency’s troubled $7 billion transit expansion program.
More recently, directors settled on hiring a general manager/CEO initially and let that executive decide whether another senior position needs to be created for FasTracks oversight.
Last summer, RTD directors named the 51-year-old Washington, a 10-year veteran of the transit agency, as interim chief.
Directors recently named former University of Colorado president John Buechner, Jefferson Economic Council president Preston Gibson, Kaiser Permanente Colorado president Donna Lynne, Lakewood Mayor Bob Murphy, Greenwood Village Mayor Nancy Sharpe and Carla Perez, Gov. Bill Ritter’s senior policy analyst for transportation, to sit on the civic panel charged with interviewing the finalists for RTD’s top post and making a recommendation to the board.
The panel met with the three finalists Thursday and presented its recommendation to a special session of RTD’s board Friday.
Those close to the process said the panel reached consensus that the 50-year-old Kelsey, who has worked for Vancouver’s transit agency for 10 years, was the best person to lead RTD.
On Saturday, several members of the panel reached by The Denver Post said they could not comment on the group’s recommendation because they were bound by a confidentiality agreement.
Also Thursday, RTD held a public forum where several hundred employees of the agency and others interested in the selection process were able to meet the finalists and question them about the direction they plan to take RTD.
Cards were distributed to those attending the forum so the public could offer comments and preferences for one finalist or another. Those familiar with the compilation of comments from these “stakeholders” say Washington had much support among those attending the forum.
Since he took over the interim job, Washington, who had a 24-year career in the military before joining RTD, has worked assiduously to smooth formerly rocky relations with Amalgamated Transit Union 1001, which represents nearly 2,000 RTD bus and light-rail operators and mechanics.
Whoever is selected as the new chief executive of RTD will have to be a great salesman, a bit of a magician and 100 percent inspirational leader.
From the mid-1990s until the recession hit in the past few years, RTD had a great run, winning best transit agency in the nation honors several times and grabbing the attention of other transit agencies eager to emulate its successes.
But with FasTracks, the agency has been beset with difficulties.
The plan to build six new trains and expand existing lines now may only see construction of two or three rail lines before the money runs out. Metro Denver taxpayers may be asked to accept a much greater financial burden for completing FasTracks.
Jeffrey Leib: 303-954-1645 or jleib@denverpost.com
