Investigation Reveals VA Gov. McDonnell Orchestrated Ouster of Pro-PLA MWAA Members

[Omaha Steve]

http://bit.ly/13fcVBF

The Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority (MWAA) was designed as a non-partisan committee that would be insulated from political pressures. The regional board has four jurisdictions — D.C., Maryland, Virginia, and the Federal government — all of whose delegates’ terms are staggered to prevent any Governor or Mayor from having too much influence over the board’s decision making.

Sadly, claims stemming from an investigation by WAMU show that Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell sought the ouster of two pro-Project Labor Agreement board members so that he could fill the board with those who opposed such an agreement for the second phase of the Dulles Metrorail Silver Line.

BACKGROUND on the long Dulles Metrorail PLA battle here, here, and here.

Emails secured by WAMU also question the official timeline given in testimony before a House Subcommittee by agency CEO Jack Potter and board vice-chairman Tom Davis concerning the departures of members Mame Reiley and Dennis Martire, supporters of the PLA.

Reiley was appointed by a Democratic Governor and stepped down in February citing health concerns. She then took a position with an annual salary of $180,000 that was created for her by the agency’s CEO, Jack Potter. The move was orchestrated by Tom Davis, co-chairman of the MWAA, who was appointed to the board by Gov. McDonnell.

Now, former board member Bob Brown says that Tom Davis did not tell the truth during his testimony, claiming that both Reiley and Davis told him that Davis had orchestrated the move. Brown told Transportation Nation,

“Nobody did anything illegal, but it goes against the grain, of the notion of these kinds of non-political regional agencies.
Tom was the one that conceived of the idea of how to persuade Mame Reiley to resign her seat and open up that prior Democratic appointment for McDonnell to fill,”

Reiley was replaced with McDonnell appointee Todd Stottlemyer, PLA opponent. With a power shift on the board and political rumblings that key players would pull out of the project if a PLA was included, the MWAA voted to move forward with the project on June 6th without using a PLA.

Responding to Transportation Nation, Davis said of the Reiley departure:

There are other people, who I am not going to get into, that basically initiated this conversation,” Davis said. “I didn’t have a dog in that fight but I thought getting her off the board frankly at that point would be a win-win for everybody. So I acquiesced and didn’t raise an objection to it.”

In November testimony, Davis claimed he knew the position was created specifically for Reiley.

“I was aware. There were board members it was run by,” Davis testified. “This was a complicated situation.”

Despite the claims from Brown, Potter reiterated his testimony to WAMU saying that the decision was his alone:

“I stand by what I testified in front of Congress. I made the decision on the hiring and it was my sole decision. I made the decision to hire Mame Reiley, period,

In November, he admitted it was not the best decision during testimony saying,

My judgment was not good in terms of the hiring of that person.” He added, however, that the position was necessary to develop land to offset rising costs at Dulles International Airport.

With Reiley gone and the project moving forward without a PLA, Gov. McDonnell set his sights on Dennis Martire, Laborers International Union of America (LiUNA!) Mid Atlantic Vice President and Regional Manager. On June 14th, he was removed from the board after accusations that he abused his travel expenditure privileges. Martire put forward a lawsuit against McDonnell immediately after his ouster:

MWAA officials called the removal of a sitting board member unprecedented, and a leading Northern Virginia Democrat said the move was all politics. “I think this is part of a raw power play — a national assault on organized labor by the Republican Party,” Rep. Gerald E. Connolly (D-Va.) said. “It’s part and parcel of an organized campaign. I don’t know how they will be able to prove cause in a court of law.”

Martire fought the allegations and removal for months before a confidential settlement was agreed upon in September.

Emails from the WAMU investigation show that Tom Davis wrote to former board member David Speck on February 18, 2012, about Martire’s ouster. Speck is currently part of the Virginia House of Delegates:

“I think they will try to remove Denny so that means two more [board] openings,” the email from Davis reads. “ [Virginia Transportation Secretary] Sean Connaughton is the key decision maker. It may be helpful for them to keep this bipartisan.”

Lost in the shuffle was Potter’s hypoicrisy. He once praised the effect of the PLA on the first phase of the Dulles project during an MWAA board meeting:

The project labor agreement included a no-strike clause. It assured that there was an available trained workforce for the project. It produced an outstanding safety record. It provided management flexibility in the form of flexible work schedules that were very much needed given the nature of the type of work that was being done,” Potter said at an MWAA board meeting.

This series of events, who was behind it, and how it played out indicate clearly Gov. McDonnell’s proclivity for bowing to party pressure and further prove claims that the entire scenario was predicated upon unjust political moves which served, above all else, to provide a big business handout and bolster one man’s anti-union credentials amidst rumors of a 2016 presidential bid.