CCTA Board Meeting Minutes
Date: March 17, 2015
Time: 7:30 AM
Place: 15 Industrial Parkway
Burlington, VT
Present:
Chapin Kaynor, Vice Chair, Williston
Denis Barton, Secretary, Shelburne
Chapin Spencer, Commissioner, Burlington
Pablo Bose, Commissioner, Burlington
Steve Magowan, Commissioner, South Burlington
Robert Millar, Commissioner, Winooski
Karla Munson, Commissioner, Hinesburg
John Sharrow, Commissioner, Milton
Bonnie Waninger, Commissioner, Lamoille County
Bob Buermann, Commissioner, Grand Isle County
Harold Garabedian, Commissioner, Washington County (by phone)
Karen Walton, General Manager
Mark Sousa, CCTA Director of Operations
Meredith Birkett, Director of Service Development
Michelle Daley, Director of Finance
Trish Redalieu, Director of Human Resources
Tim Bradshaw, GMTA Director of Operations
Steve Carlson, Project Manager
Adrienne Cochrane, Marketing and Outreach Manager
Emily Bowser, Administrative Assistant
Joe Staab, GMTA Driver
Members of the Public:
Margaret Roddy, VCAPT
Chuck Norris-Brown, VCAPT
Don MacDonald
Not Present:
Catherine Dimitruk, Chair, Franklin County
Marti Powers, Treasurer, Essex
1. Open Meeting
Vice Chair Kaynor opened the meeting at 7:33 a.m. A quorum of the Board was present.
2. Adjustment of the Agenda
A request was made for an adjustment of the agenda to include an update on the Downtown Transit
Center prior to item 6. Commissioner Waninger requested to add a line item at the end of the agenda to
discuss Board membership.
Public Comment
Margaret Roddy noted that today (March 17, 2015) marked the one year anniversary for the start of the
CCTA strike. She commended the Board, management and the drivers for all the hard work that has
contributed to a total change of direction CCTA has taken in terms of how it has run.
4. Consent Agenda
Commissioner Barton asked to remove the minutes from the consent agenda. A motion to approve the
consent agenda excluding the minutes was made by Commissioner Spencer and seconded by
Commissioner Buermann. All were in favor and the motion passed.
Commissioner Barton noted a formatting issue on the attendance section of the minutes. Commissioner
Barton and Commissioner Waninger were shown as representing the wrong municipalities. A motion to
accept the minutes with corrections was made by Commissioner Munson and seconded by
Commissioner Bose. All were in favor and the motion passed.
5. Update on the Downtown Transit Center
On the bid due date of March 6th, bids from four contractors were received. The contractor qualification
review was completed on March 12th. The bids were open on March 16th but none came in under
budget, with the low bid just under $7.4 million. Steve Carlson will be meeting with the architects and
engineers after the Board meeting to begin a value engineering exercise to see what can be done to
reduce costs and look at additional revenue sources.
Commissioner Magowan and Commissioner Waninger entered the meeting at 7:45 a.m.
6. Safety Slogan Contest Award and Vermont Statewide Safety Award
Karen Walton spoke of the Safety Slogan Contest that both CCTA and GMTA employees participated in.
Joe Staab, a driver from GMTA won the contest with the slogan: “Safety is not just what we do, it’s who
we are.”
Mark Sousa spoke of CCTA driver, Hunter Eddy. Mr. Eddy ordered a small quantity of reflective snap
wrist bands to give to students on his morning school bus run. He asked the students to put them on
when he picks them up in the morning to be able to see them more clearly. His idea was to enhance the
safety of the student passengers; the wrist bands have ‘be safe be seen’ written on them. This idea
caught on very quickly and now any school, statewide, can phone the DMV and order these wrist bands
for their students. Mr. Eddy was recognized for this idea with the Vermont Statewide Safety Award.
CCTA will now be incorporating these wrist bands into the safety program and putting the new safety
slogan on them as well.
7. Transit Funding Summer Study
Catherine Dimitruk, Karen Walton, and Meredith Birkett went to the State House on February 26th and
offered testimony to the Senate Transportation Committee summarizing the core issues of how the
current local funding framework for transit is preventing services from moving forward and the need for
a summer study to analyze local funding options. The Leadership Committee thought it would be a good
idea for the Board to formerly adopt a position statement that could be used when forwarding draft
study language to the transportation committees and other legislators as well as for public
consumption, such as posting on the website or referencing it in press releases. Ms. Birkett explained
that the position statement is asking the State to study this issue on a formal level. Commissioner Barton
made a motion to accept the document as written and was seconded by Commissioner Spencer.
Commissioner Spencer asked for an amendment to the document to read that “The CCTA Board of
Commissioners believes it is imperative that the State, transit providers and stakeholders statewide
recognize these challenges and work together to find a solution.” All were in favor of this amendment
and the position statement was adopted.
Ms. Birkett also explained that staff has been working on two potential tracks for study language, one
version is a modification to language VTrans already presented to the House Transportation committee
as part of a broader funding study and the other version seeks a separate stand-alone study just focused
on transit local funding. The Board offered feedback on the two options, including potential study
committee membership. Commissioner Waninger noted that including RPC representation on the
committee could be helpful. Commissioner Spencer questioned whether it might be simpler to move
forward with just the modified VTrans language. Ultimately, the Board encouraged staff to work on the
final version of the study language to be sent to the Senate Transportation Committee by the end of
March and asked that staff work with VPTA.
8. Board Self-Evaluation Results and Discussion
The Board took part in a self-evaluation online survey in December. The survey was completed during a
transitional period of CCTA, i.e., new members were elected to the Board and Karen Walton was just
starting as the new General Manager for the organization. It was suggested that this evaluation should
be completed again sooner rather than later and possibly bi-annually. The survey will be condensed and
taken by the Board again. The Leadership Committee will discuss at their next meeting where to go next
with future self-evaluations.
9. Kids Summer Pass
CCTA is looking in to providing an additional resource for transportation to working families during the
summer school break through a youth summer pass. The pass will offer unlimited access to all LOCAL
routes using a non-traditional pass type, such as a bracelet or necklace available for Middle and High
School Students from July through August (when school is not in session.) This program received broad
support from the Board.
Commissioner Magowan left the meeting at 9:00 a.m.
10. Unlimited Access Policy and Employer Paid Pass Discount Policy
The policies have been revised since the February 17th Board Meeting. A new proposal for both policies
is a standard 10% discount, excluding non-transportation management associations. TMA’s such as
CATMA will receive a 28% discount. St. Michael’s College will continue to receive the 25% discount; it
has been grandfathered in to the new policy. Commissioner Waninger motioned to adopt both policies
and was seconded by Commissioner Buermann. All were in favor and the policies were adopted.
11. GMTA Service Planning Update
The Montpelier Circulator schedule may have a possible route change of stopping Saturday service due
to low ridership and reallocating those hours to the weekday service. There has been a request from the
Montpelier City Council to look at reverse routing on State Street and more permanent service to the
Terrace Street area which currently has by request stops only.
There has been a request by the town of Highgate to have a fixed stop put in place on the AlburghGeorgia Commuter route. Currently there is a by request stop in Highgate but the town will be building a
park and ride to accommodate a fixed stop. The Alburgh park and ride is being considered to be put on
the fixed stop list as well. A formal proposal will be presented at the April Board meeting.
12. Finance Committee Report
Kimberly Wall, Project Coordinator for CCTA gave an annual presentation of the urban grants at the
committee’s March meeting. The presentation detailed the kind of funding there is for the urban
system. Next month the committee will be looking at trend analysis and a possible recommendation to
transfer the rural fund balance for different ideas and projects going forward.
13. Strategy Committee Report
The committee reviewed each of the technologies suggested in the draft task 2 deliverable. The
committee then discussed prioritizing the technologies based on needs of the system and passengers
acknowledging that the actual implementation of technologies might not be able to follow the priorities
due to cost/sequencing of projects. The committee also discussed the youth summer pass.
14. Operations Committee Report
The committee went through an assessment of internal and external stakeholders. Major areas that
have been looked at are Human Resources, Safety, Operations, and Maintenance. The committee is
looking at data that is already being collected and what data still needs to be collected in order to set
and meet goals. The Operations Committee is trying to get into a smaller amount of metrics with more
targeting indicators of what kind of progress is being made. The work plan at this point will be looking
into the emergency preparedness plan, labor relations issues (the after action report) and looking into
Human Resources policies.
15. Other Business
The monthly Board meeting on May 19th will be held at Montpelier City Hall (the Memorial Room) from
4:30 p.m. – 6:30 p.m.
16. Board Membership
Commissioner Waninger announced her resignation of the CCTA Board of Commissioners effective April
17th 2015 as she has accepted a new job as the Central Vermont Regional Planning Commission
Executive Director.
18. Adjourn
The meeting adjourned at 9:28 a.m.