LISTEN: Off The Rails Part 2: Former GM Says Metro’s Board is the Source of All Problems

Steve Burns
WMAL.com

WASHINGTON – (WMAL) “It’s a tragedy. It really is.”

Metro faces many problems and issues, from constant breakdowns, to equipment failures, to charges of mismanagement. And former General Manager David Gunn thinks they can all be blamed on one entity.

“All of the problems that you have can be traced back to that board,” Gunn recently told WMAL.

He calls the board “incompetent”.

“Sixteen people, none of whom, or most of whom, know nothing about the business,” Gunn said. “What you’ve got is a bunch of politicians, with no one in charge, and a screwy arrangement of voting, and alternate members, and a rotating chair.”

The Board of Directors is comprised of 16 members, four each from Maryland, Virginia, D.C., and the federal government. They regularly meet once a week.

“What do they do once a week? What do they add?” Gunn asked. “They don’t understand what the role of a board is, I guess.”

Gunn was at the helm at WMATA for three years in the early 90s, constantly butting heads with that board.

“They were driving me nuts with some demands,” Gunn said. He announced he’d quit at the end of the contract. “I did that just to give myself the freedom to manage the thing properly while I was there.”

He said a good GM has to fight with the board to keep the system afloat. A complacent GM, he explained, will last a while, but we’ll end up with the less than fully functional system we have today.

“What you’re seeing is the result of having General Managers not stand up to the board,” Gunn said.

Asked what his ideal governmental body for WMATA would be, he said there should be just one person appointed by the governors and mayor, because that removes the political cover for them.

“Right now they can say ‘gee this is awful’ and they can look and sympathize with the riders and it’s not their problem,” Gunn said. “It should be their problem, because it is their problem.”