An impasse over a seat on Metro’s board of directors is slated to be resolved Monday morning, with Virginia’s governor finally winning a seat after more than a year of trying.
The resolution also will lead to Northern Virginia transit agencies receiving more than $20 million that was held hostage during the fight.
The Northern Virginia Transportation Commission and Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell’s office have been sparring for more than a year over who gets the authority to fill Virginia’s four seats on Metro’s 16-seat board of directors. Maryland, the District and the federal government have the remaining seats.
Now the two sides have agreed on language after negotiations with lawyers, and the NVTC plans to sign an agreement with the state Monday morning, said NVTC Chairman and Alexandria Mayor Bill Euille.
What it means is that the governor’s office will get to have its appointee, prominent local lawyer Jim Dyke, join the Metro board in January, Euille said. In turn, he said, the state “will turn on the spigot and release the funds.”
It is not clear, however, which of the four Metro board members who currently represent Northern Virginia will lose their spot to Dyke. Fairfax County has two seats, one of them an alternate slot, while Arlington has a voting seat and Alexandria has an alternate seat. Euille said that needs to be worked out internally.
“It’s just a matter of who will have the other voting seats,” he said.
The state had asked the NVTC and local governments to give the state a potential seat on any oversight board of public transit providers receiving state money. When the NVTC didn’t sign the agreement, fearing it would violate other rules governing Metro, the state withheld the money it gives to the NVTC to disburse to agencies such as Metro, the Fairfax Connector and Virginia Railway Express.
The two sides clarified on Friday that the governor’s office would get one seat, not two.
Last year, McDonnell unsuccessfully threatened to withhold $50 million in state funding unless the state got to appoint two seats on the board. Then he tacked an amendment onto the state budget giving him one voting seat on Metro’s board, but NVTC members said the move violated the legal documents governing Metro.
