TCAT Board welcomes new chair, new directors & new managers

Deborah Dawson

The nine-member TCAT Board reorganized in early December by electing Dawson to take over the helm, and by voting in two new board members, all of whom attended their first regularly scheduled meeting of the year Thursday evening. Per the board’s annual rotation of officers. Dawson replaces 2023 Chair Denise Thompson, Cornell University’s manager of off-campus living, who is starting her sixth year on the board in the role of immediate past chair.

Over the past four years, a combination of driver shortages and maintenance issues has forced TCAT to curtail service across urban, campus and rural routes. Ridership in 2023 was 2.1 million annual trips, about 60 percent of what it was in 2019.

Thompson, Dawson, and other board members over the past few years have been volunteering their spare time and resources more than usual to help TCAT staff meet the unprecedented challenges the Covid pandemic brought upon local transit and transit agencies all over the country starting in early 2020.

Dawson cited TCAT’s recent onboarding of new managers (see story right), all of whom, she said, will complement TCAT’s existing staff. She also noted that the board is now launching a nationwide search to replace General Manager Scot Vanderpool, who is retiring, effective March 1, after seven years with TCAT and 40 years in the transit industry.

“As with other employers, TCAT continues to adjust to what is now a vastly changed labor market,” said Dawson, adding, “But we think that a number of recruitment and retention initiatives we’ve been putting into place will help move the needle in 2024 toward improving a service that is so essential to our entire county.”Dawson first served on the board from 2019 through 2021 but returned at the recommendation of the county to fill a seat left vacant by fellow Tompkins County Legislator Dan Klein, who now is chairperson of the Legislature.

Susan Currie

In addition to new management staff, the board is also welcoming newcomers to include Tompkins County Legislator Susan Currie and Shan Varma, human resources director, Campus and Student Life, Cornell.Currie was recommended by Tompkins County to fill a seat previously held by Frank P. Proto, a former county legislator. Proto was among a group of local stakeholders who 40 years ago helped shepherd the eventual creation of TCAT as a not-for-profit corporation through a consolidation of three transit systems operated by the City of Ithaca, Tompkins County and Cornell University.

Cornell recommended Varma to finish the remaining term of Gary Stewart, Cornell’s associate director of Community Engagement. Stewart has served on the TCAT Board since 2019 and was reelected in 2021 for a three-year term, ending Dec. 2024.

Shan Varma

Another recent newcomer to the board is Tompkins County Legislator Shawna Black, who was elected to the board effective Oct. 1. Black was elected to replace the remaining term of Tompkins County Administrator Lisa Holmes, also through Dec. 2024.

TCAT’s board is structured as follows: the City of Ithaca, Tompkins County and Cornell University are TCAT’s local funders. TCAT was established as a joint venture of transit agencies from each of the three in 1998, and later became a private, not-for-profit corporation, effective 2005. As such, each funder is entitled to recommend three people to serve on the board. Those recommended, in turn, are considered for election by the TCAT board and, in their capacity as TCAT board members, serve TCAT independently. Board members serve one-year terms as officers on a rotating basis.

Other board members are:

• Kelley Cooper, senior director, Finance and Administration for Cornell’s Facilities and Campus Services, who joined the board in 2023, at the recommendation of Cornell. Cooper is serving as the board’s secretary-treasurer this year.
• Jennifer Dotson, longtime transportation advocate, former executive director for the Center for Community Transportation, and former City of Ithaca alderperson has served on the TCAT board since 2008, at the recommendation of the city. Dotson this year is serving as the board’s vice-chairperson.
• Laura Lewis, former mayor of the City of Ithaca, city alderperson, and previous director of undergraduate student services at Cornell’s IRL school, has served on the board since 2019, at the city’s recommendation.
• Ducson Nguyen, Ithaca Common Council-District 2 alderperson and software engineer has served on the board since 2016, also recommended by the city.

As new board chair, Dawson heads the board’s executive committee, which includes Dotson, Cooper, and Thompson. Fulfilling one of her first duties as chair, Dawson also issued board committee assignments as follows:

• Audit: Lewis (chair), Black and Varma
• Budget: Cooper (chair), Dawson and Nguyen
• Human Resources: Black (chair), Currie, Lewis, Thompson, and Varma
• Planning: Nguyen (chair) Cooper, Dawson, Dotson, and Thompson
• Transit Service: Dotson(chair), Currie and Thompson. Non-board members serving on the committee are Town of Caroline Supervisor Mark Witmer and Fernando de Aragón, executive director of the Ithaca-Tompkins County Transportation Council (ITCTC), the Metropolitan Planning Organization, responsible for facilitating county-wide transportation planning.

Dotson will represent TCAT on the ITCTC’s policy committee. Matthew Rosenbloom-Jones, TCAT’s new service development manager, will participate in the council’s planning committee.