Amtrak's President Is Fired by Its Board

[Guest guest]

Amtrak's President Is Fired by Its Board

 

 

By MATTHEW L. WALD

Published: November 9, 2005

 

WASHINGTON, Nov. 9 - Amtrak's board of directors fired the company's

president this morning after months of disagreement over a Bush

administration plan to privatize parts of the national passenger rail

system and spin off other parts to partial state ownership.

 

David Gunn, who is widely credited with improving the railroad's

management, cutting costs and imposing better financial controls, was

fired today by Amtrack's board of directors.

 

The president, David Gunn, who came out of retirement to take the job

three years ago, is widely credited with improving the railroad's

management, cutting costs, imposing better financial controls and

improving the state of repair of Amtrak's locomotives and aging

passenger cars, as well as its tracks, signals and electrical systems,

which are truly antique.

 

But Mr. Gunn also opposed the Bush plan to turn over the Northeast

Corridor - the tracks from Washington to Boston that are the

railroad's main physical asset - to a federal-state consortium.

 

And while ridership has risen to record levels recently, costs are

also up sharply, with government auditors predicting that Amtrak's

budget deficit will grow sharply larger in the next few years. The

Bush administration has said it is determined to end the perennial

subsidies to the railroad, which was created 30 years ago to take over

passenger service as the commercial railroads abandoned that business

as unprofitable.

 

In a statement, the chairman of the board, David Laney, said that Mr.

Gunn had helped make improvements but that " Amtrak's future now

requires a different type of leader who will aggressively tackle the

company's financial, management and operational challenges. "

 

" The need to bring fundamental change to Amtrak is greater and more

urgent than ever before, " he said.

 

Mr. Gunn, in a brief telephone interview, said, " Obviously what their

goal is, and it's been their goal from the beginning, is to liquidate

the company. "

 

Some of Amtrak's supporters immediately pledged to seek his

re-instatement.

 

Amtrak has had a decidedly mixed track record in the last few days.

The Senate just voted 93-6 to authorize $11.6 billion for Amtrak over

the next six years, although the vote did not actually appropriate any

money. That measure, which must face a differing House version in a

conference committee, would make the Amtrak president a member of the

board of directors, all of whom were appointed by President Bush.

 

Both the House and Senate have supported aid packages for the current

fiscal year that are far more generous that the White House has proposed.

 

But the Government Accountability Office, the auditing arm of

Congress, said last week that while progress had been made at the

railroad, Amtrak still needed " fundamental improvements. "

 

" Amtrak lacks a meaningful strategic plan that provides a clear

mission and measurable corporatewide goals, strategies and outcomes to

guide the organization, " the auditors said.

 

The transportation secretary, Norman Y. Mineta, who is the senior

member of the Amtrak board, responded that the G.A.O. finding was

" devastating " and that the board " must stop and take a fresh look on

how to proceed in the face of this non-partisan, objective, report of

systemic failure. " Mr. Mineta has embraced the Bush plan to spin off

the Northeast Corridor and open Amtrak's other routes to competition

from other train operators.

 

Supporters describe the loss of Mr. Gunn as a major blow. Mr. Gunn is

credited with turning around the New York City subway system in the

late 1980's, and after that, presiding over a massive construction

effort in Washington to build the rail transit system here.

 

He came to Amtrak in the spring of 2002, after previous management had

driven the railroad deep into debt in an effort to achieve

" operational self-sufficiency, " as had been ordered by Congress in an

earlier reform effort.

 

Amtrak said that its chief engineer, David Hughes, would assume Mr.

Gunn's responsibilities on an acting basis.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/09/national/09cnd-amtrak.html