APTA Committee Profile: Public Transportation CEO Coordinating Council

Debra A. Johnson, Outgoing Chair
General Manager and CEO
Regional Transportation District
Denver, CO

Jay Fox, Incoming Chair
Executive Director
Utah Transit Authority
Salt Lake City, UT

Matthew Dutkevicz, Incoming Vice Chair
Executive Director
Butler County Regional Transit Authority
Hamilton, OH

APTA Staff Advisor: Art Guzzetti, Vice President, Policy, Mobility, Technical Services, and Innovation

What attracted you to the industry?

Johnson: I was drawn to the public transportation industry through my early work in community engagement, public participation, and government relations, beginning as a public participation specialist in a private consulting firm supporting a major capital highway project and later in roles at BART, VTA, WMATA, SFMTA, LA Metro, and Long Beach Transit. Across these positions, I developed a deep appreciation for how transit connects people to opportunity, strengthens communities, and serves as a foundation for economic vitality.

Dutkevicz: I got into transit the way a lot of people do—I needed a job…it turned into a career. I’ve been at Butler County RTA for almost 17 years, the last 10 as executive director.

Describe your role at your agency.

Johnson: As general manager and CEO of RTD, I lead all aspects of a multi-modal transit system with a $1.1 billion operating budget and a 2,349‑square‑mile service area. I oversee 3,300 employees delivering bus, commuter rail, light rail, paratransit, and microtransit service across 40 municipalities and eight counties. My responsibilities include implementing board policy; strengthening financial, operational, and organizational systems; advancing strategic priorities focused on community value, customer excellence, employee ownership, and financial success; and ensuring RTD continues to innovate and evolve to meet regional mobility needs.

Dutkevicz: BCRTA is a small agency with an unusually complicated map. Butler County is home to roughly 400,000 people and is partially a commuter county for Cincinnati, so part of our territory sits inside a large urbanized area while we also have a small urbanized area of our own, plus suburban and rural communities. We also operate more than 28,000 annual hours of campus bus service for Miami University, which is a full transit system in its own right. We have run county-wide dial-a-ride since long before anyone called it microtransit. My job is to keep those very different service models pointed in the same direction: funding strategy, partnerships with the county, the university, and our municipalities, and making sure our people have what they need to run the service.

What does the APTA Transit CEO Coordinating Council do?

Johnson: The council ensures that the priorities and needs of transit agency CEOs are elevated, addressed, and advanced within APTA and its leadership. The council serves as a forum for CEOs to share perspectives and coordinate responses to major industry issues.

Dutkevicz: The council moves information, guidance, and recommendations out to industry leaders and the APTA leadership, and it makes sure APTA’s positions on legislation, regulation, and policy reflect the experience of the CEOs delivering service. It is also a sounding board for members on issues that aren’t yet formalized.

How is the work of the council reflected in your own agency?

Dutkevicz: Mostly in judgment. A council of CEOs is a room full of people who have already tried the thing you are about to try. It also keeps an agency from operating in a vacuum. Butler County’s problems do not look like Los Angeles’, but the underlying questions of workforce, funding, fare policy, and safety are the same questions, and hearing how they get answered at other scales sharpens how we answer them at home.

What industry practices have been adopted as a result of the work of the council?

Johnson: Industry-wide practices shaped by council dialogue include improved safety and security coordination; established procurement practices; collaborative approaches to accessibility and customer-focused innovation; peer-informed operational optimization; and shared lessons from major events such as the World Cup. These conversations help transit CEOs adopt strategies and frameworks that have been workshopped collectively in council discussions.

Dutkevicz: A good example is how agencies demonstrate cleanliness, safety, and family-friendliness, and how we say so in language that lands outside our own field. That kind of conversation does not produce a standard or a manual, but it changes how agencies across the country frame their case to the people who fund them.

What are the council’s top priorities for the year?

Johnson: Strengthening CEO engagement in federal policy development; advancing innovation and accessibility; and deepening best-practice sharing among CEOs.

How does the council engage its members in these priorities?

Johnson: Through focused communications, committees and task forces, and the annual Transit CEO Seminar. The council leadership meets monthly; these meetings allow for dynamic conversation, real-time insights from agency leaders, and shared problem-solving.

Dutkevicz: The council’s most vibrant conversations are usually about what is bubbling up from members rather than what is on the agenda.

What are the main challenges, priorities, and opportunities facing the industry over the next few years?

Johnson: Key challenges include funding stability, bus manufacturing, paratransit service cost-escalation, climate resilience, evolving regulatory landscapes, safety and security expectations, workforce recruitment and retention, and changing customer needs around reliability, affordability, and access. Opportunities include expanded federal support, emerging mobility technologies, data-driven service planning, and stronger integration of transit within regional sustainability and growth strategies.

Fox: Preparing the industry for incorporating AI into our operations, ensuring sustainable funding streams for public transportation, and marketing public transportation as critical infrastructure generating economic return for its communities. 

Dutkevicz: The real challenge is evolution. Travelers change how, when, and why they move, and we have to change with them, meeting our communities’ needs in the ways they want.

How does service on the council add value to its participants?

Johnson: Participation offers exposure to national policy discussions, opportunities to collaborate with peer CEOs, expanded strategic and operational insight, and a deeper understanding of industry trends. It also strengthens networks across agencies and provides visibility into federal priorities, best practices, and emerging challenges.

Fox: Peer exchange and support are critically important to the chief accountable executive at a transit organization. Having the council members as a resource is the greatest return to service.