APTA | Passenger Transport
February 19, 2010

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Check out the classifieds for numerous transit career opportunities including a chief executive officer!
 
APTA NEWS

Transit CEOs Hear from FTA’s Rogoff at Annual Seminar

“Writ large, the FTA [Federal Transit Administration] budget request [for Fiscal Year 2011] is $10.8 billion—a little larger than last year, but it is a tight budget in terms of everything we’d like to do and given the status of [federal transportation] authorization.”

That’s the news FTA Administrator Peter Rogoff gave, via conference call, to public transportation executives participating in the recent APTA Transit CEOs Seminar in Stuart, FL.

Rogoff said FTA restructured its budget request to align with the Obama administration’s priorities and noted the introduction of a new transit safety initiative: a State of Good Repair program. Overall, this initiative will grow about 80 percent with dollars channeled to both rail and bus in a formula that will recognize the level of effort of grantees themselves in tending to their own needs.

The administrator announced publication in the Federal Register of an invitation for membership applications for a new Transit Rail Safety Advisory Committee. “We expect that the advisory committee will be broadly representative of the transit industry and help meet regulatory goals,” he added.

He also discussed authorization of surface transportation legislation, as the current law will expire at the end of February, and FTA’s work with the Department of Housing and Urban Development regarding livable communities and urban circulator services.

Before the conference call, seminar participants met with representatives of federal agencies and transit safety professionals for “Leading with Safety,” a five-hour workshop on organizational culture. Topics included the Federal Railroad Administration’s Passenger Rail System Safety Rule and risk management programs including a pilot project on reporting close calls, with Amtrak, Union Pacific, and other organizations, and APTA’s system safety management program, peer reviews, and safety audits.

Thomas Krause, Ph.D., chairman and co-founder of Behavioral Science Technology, reported on the science behind creating a safety culture. He described the findings of a 10-year study with more than 70 organizations, noting a relationship between leaders’ high assessment scores in overall management and their organizations’ safety records.

The president and CEO of the Eno Transportation Forum, Stephen Van Beek, Ph.D., offered two presentations at the seminar: one for CEOs of smaller bus systems and one for all attendees on transforming the organization’s scope of services to encompass mobility management.

Another highlight was a presentation by Dave Jensen, president of S3 Inc. in Los Angeles and senior lecturer, executive education, with the Emory University School of Business. Focusing on how public transit CEOs can learn “the eXpansive Leadership Method, or XLM,” Jensen said: “If you want your employees to embrace change, give them stability.”

 

Presenters at the “How to Work with Developers” session, from left: Gary Thomas, president/executive director, Dallas Area Rapid Transit; Joni Earl, chief executive officer of Sound Transit in Seattle; and Joseph Calabrese, CEO and general manager of the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority.

 

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