Capital Area Transit System CEO Bob Mirabito and the transit system’s board members have found themselves talking more about controversies than customer service in recent weeks, after several Metro Council members have called on Mirabito to resign over a dispute with union bus drivers and racially charged comments he made recently about the makeup of CATS staff.
Late Tuesday, Mirabito apologized for the comments. In a prepared statement, he says, “It was never my intention to offend anyone, and I am sorry that my comments on a recent podcast have distracted our community from our continued push to move our transit system forward.”
CATS Board Chair Donna Collins-Lewis says this morning that she’s confident the transit system can move beyond the recent distractions and steer the discussion on CATS back to best practices for improving the system. The controversies cropped up as Collins-Lewis has been negotiating a long-term contract with Mirabito. She says she doesn’t expect the recent incidents will hinder the negotiations.
“I can’t see that it would,” says Collins-Lewis, who also is a member of the Metro Council. “We’re still negotiating with Bob, there have been some things that we’ve kind of gone back and forth on—not anything contentious, just coming to terms on the details—but I think we’re close to having something that we can all agree on.”
Collins-Lewis says she hopes to bring a final contract proposal to the CATS board within 30 days. Contract negotiations with Mirabito have been underway since September 2014, when the CATS board signed off on pursuing a long-term contract. Mirabito was hired on an interim basis in May 2013 with an annual salary of $140,000.
Collins-Lewis says she had hoped to have a long-term contract with Mirabito finalized by now, and admits the recent events have not helped speed up the process. However, she says the controversies have not shaken her faith in Mirabito as leader of the transit system.
CATS board member Jim Brandt—who also supports Mirabito—says he’s hopeful a long-term contract with the CEO can be reached as soon as possible. He’s also confident the transit system and board can move beyond the recent controversies.
“Yeah, we do have some major issues to resolve. We’re far from a perfect system. We need to focus on customer service and making the system more functional and safer for everyone,” he says. “It’s counterproductive to waste a lot of time and discussion over matters that aren’t really important … I think we can put it in our rear view mirror and I don’t think it’s something that will have a lingering effect.”
The CATS board is set to meet on Tuesday. As of this morning, Mirabito’s contract was not on the agenda, though it could be added before Tuesday.
—Steve Sanoski
