RTD Fires Bus Operations Chief as Dyer Unveils Plan

Faced with a rising tide of criticism, Southern California Rapid Transit District officials Thursday announced the firing of the executive in charge of its bus operations. At the same time, RTD General Manager John Dyer proposed a sweeping overhaul of district operations.

As Dyer was releasing his trouble-shooting plan, word came that Transportation Director Ed Nash has been ousted. Nash, a retired Air Force major general, had been in charge of service for RTD’s 1.5 million daily passengers since 1984. With Dyer’s consent, Nash was removed by his boss, Assistant General Manager Robert Korach, Wednesday night and was gone from district offices on Thursday.

Korach denied that Nash’s departure as head of the much-criticized bus operations was part of a pending management shake-up outlined by Dyer. He said the change had been coming for some time. “His management style and mine just don’t work well together,” he said.

But Korach also said he was dissatisfied with Nash’s lack of previous experience in transit system operations. “He simply had to be steeped in transit management,” he said.

Korach stopped short of blaming Nash for criticisms of driver training, reports of rising complaints about bus service and scheduling, lack of current licenses by some drivers and other day-to-day bus operations problems under Nash’s authority.

Nash could not be reached for comment.

Korach immediately named Leilia Bailey, who has worked her way from bus driver to assistant transportation director, to fill Nash’s job.

Dyer’s plan for RTD reform, which he personally drafted and has held out as a comprehensive solution to a series of problems that he has acknowledged is plaguing the beleaguered transit district, sets ambitious new goals and calls for a variety of actions. These include reducing employee absenteeism and drug use, introducing new ways of preventing bus accidents and crime, improving service, curbing travel expenses and producing “a leaner and meaner” operation. Dyer pledged that, if implemented and fully financed, the program would produce a dramatic turnaround in the performance of the district in six months.

However, the lengthy plan, which Dyer estimated would require $2.5 million in additional spending, was greeted with open skepticism and some harsh criticism when he presented it to RTD board members.

Board member John Day said he was “profoundly disturbed” by Dyer’s report, which he said suggests reforms that should have occurred long ago. For example, he said, the RTD board and management have known that absenteeism has been a major problem for years. The changes Dyer is recommending, in the face of a storm of public criticism, “should have already happened,” Day said.

Board member Nikolas Patsaouras complained that the plan lacks tough, specific recommendations in many cases. “You say ‘lean and mean’ but you are not mean enough,” Patsaouras told Dyer.

Other board members questioned how politically practical Dyer’s plan is, considering that it depends in large part on securing funds from other local government agencies. Some of those entities, such as the county Board of Supervisors and Transportation Commission, have been among the chief critics of RTD’s alleged lack of firm management and its spending policies.

Citing the $2.5-million price tag and plans to add staff, including a new deputy general manager, board member Carmen Estrada said: “I see we’re getting fatter. In what ways are we getting leaner?”

Dyer projected that his package, which will be reviewed and acted on by the board in the coming weeks, would yield nearly $4 million in savings in 1988.

Major Features

Key elements of the package call for a management restructuring--to be outlined later--designed to improve efficiency and cut costs, and regular outside and internal audits to enable management to recognize and make corrections before they become crises. Dyer also recommended producing an independently audited “report card” on how much improvement is made in 12 key problem areas of service, employee performance and overall management over the next six months.

RTD’s current troubles began last year with charges of safety and drug use problems among drivers after several major bus accidents. That was followed by a stream of reports of high absenteeism among drivers, poor monitoring of driver’s license records, alleged fraud and sloppy management in RTD’s insurance programs, uncontrolled spending on travel and entertainment, rising rider complaints and soaring management costs.

Dyer, who has insisted that he intends to remain at the helm of the agency, claimed that the program is “the most intense effort to reform a transit system undertaken in the United States. . . . We’ve got to get the RTD out of its structural groove of bureaucracy and get management looking at new ways to solve problems.”

But some of Dyer’s chief critics remained unconvinced. Supervisor Michael Antonovich said the plan “is similar to the purchase of smoke detectors after the house has been destroyed by fire.” Dyer “has 180 days to turn his agency around,” Antonovich said. “If he fails, his removal will be necessary,” although the Board of Supervisors lacks the authority to dismiss him.