The first federal appointee to have a vote on Metro’s board said the D.C. region’s transit agency is “in serious disorder,” and it will require significant steps to turn the situation around.
The federal government announced the appointment of two Metro Board of Directors members on Sunday, marking an expanded role of the feds in the operations of the beleaguered system.
Mortimer L. Downey, a former New York City Metropolitan Transit Authority director and U.S. Department of Transportation deputy secretary, is expected to be sworn in Thursday as a director. Marcel Acosta, executive director of the National Capital Planning Commission, will serve as an alternate director.
Downey and Acosta are two of the four new federal representatives set to join Metro’s board as part of a $150 million funding agreement from Congress.
The two join the governing body of an agency facing one the most turbulent periods in its history. On top of a $215 million shortfall, Metro is without a general manager to replace John Catoe, who announced his resignation earlier this month, and is still recovering from a June 2009 crash that claimed nine lives. But the troubles are far from unique to Metro, Downey said.
As head of New York’s transit agency, he confronted a deteriorating, financially struggling system transit system “in far worse physical shape.” Downey said the agency has “got to recognize — which I think the board does and public does — that things are not good, and that we’ve got to take some significant steps to turn it around.”
The appointments are “something we welcome,” said Metro’s outgoing Chairman Jim Graham. “It was long awaited,” he said. “I’m really pleased at how qualified they are.” He said both Downey and Acosta are clearly transit experts who are well-connected with the Obama administration. He hopes the remaining two members to be picked will also have such connections.
They could help bring in more federal money to help with the operation, not just the infrastructure of the transit system, he said. But, he said, he was surprised to hear only Saturday about the appointments from the interim General Services Administration administrator.
“These folks should have been appointed 10 months ago,” Graham said. “We’ve been waiting patiently.”
