Some Regional Transportation District Board of Directors claim that the agency staff members are trying to eclipse their authority in planning for the future.
The board members grew miffed at a Tuesday night work session at efforts by agency planners to update RTD’s five-year strategic plan.
As it stands, they said, planners were taking a lead role in pushing through long-range policy changes, as far as 20 years down the road, with scant oversight by the board.
“I am really troubled by this. It’s deeply disturbing to me,” board member Claudia Folska said. “By taking this five to 20 years in the future, you are rendering this body irrelevant.”
Added board member Judy Lubow: “The board’s role in our strategic plan is to set the goals and the staff has to implement them. In a sense, the board is to take the starring role in this and I don’t see that in what you are giving us.”
RTD officials said the board will be directly involved in the planning process and will give the ultimate approval to any strategic plan.
Tuesday night’s presentation “was the first step in explaining to the board that we will be conducting the update by including the board and our stakeholders throughout the process, with the board having the ongoing and final say on the plan,” said RTD spokesman Scott Reed.
“We will be discussing this further with the board to clear up any misunderstanding as to the proposed process and the overall goals of the strategic plan.”
The plan update will take into account several new factors, including financial impacts, demographic changes, technology improvements, update population and employment numbers, ridership and environmental factors, Reed said.
The update process — which will culminate with a board adoption of a new plan in spring 2015 — will include several meetings with RTD users and employees.
Other board members were happy with staff’s handling of the update.
“This is something we talked about in our (previous) work session,” said board member Lorraine Anderson. “I guess I’m missing something here.”
Monte Whaley: 720-929-0907, mwhaley@denverpost.com or twitter.com/montewhaley
