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ETA. I’m Christian. And I’m Levi. These are real conversations with the innovators, operators, and advocates driving improvements in public transportation. Today, we’re talking with Frank White

III, former CEO of the Kansas City Area Transportation. Authority, and founder and managing partner of Praxis Advisors Group. Frank’s time at KCATA put him at the center of some of the hardest decisions transit leaders have to make, from workforce and funding pressures to regional coordination, fair policy, and the role transit should play in economic development. We’ talk about why agencies have to get the basics right first, how leaders navigate competing priorities with data and transparency, and what Frank learned about the realities of sitting in the CEO seat. Here’s our conversation with Frank

White III. Welcome back to Stop Requested. Today, we have Frank White III, founder and managing partner at Praxis Advisors Group, and former CEO of KCATA. Frank, how are you today? I’m good, guys. How are you? Doing very well. This is gonna be a great conversation, Frank. Really our pleasure to have you on. Uh, for those who are listening who might not know you yet, I’m, I’d be surprised if they didn’t, but if they don’t, uh, would you introduce yourself and give us a brief background to, you know, what you do at Praxis Advisors Group?

Okay. Yeah. Uh, obviously, Frank White III, president, president, founder, and managing partner of Praxis Advisors Group. I got the rest of it myself. Um, and so what we do at Praxis, we really focus on the intersection, um, and what we believe is the future of transit, being mobility tr- transformation, executive intelligence, and transit-oriented development. We also do some advisory work as well. And so that is what we do, and it keeps us very, very busy.

Excellent. Well, Frank, what got you into public transportation? What, what was the backstory there? We always find when we talk to guests on the podcast that they, they have kind of a, a snaking, nonlinear path to be able to, to get to where they are right now. I’m curious what yours is. Well, mine was very nonlinear. Um, I wa- I actually was in, at an insurance agency, uh, before I got into public transit, and my father, at the time, was a county executive in Jackson County, Missouri, and I, he asked me to introduce him, which I did, and apparently our, the then CEO, Rob DeMachen, heard my speech, um, and called me and offered me a job because he was trying to find folks in, coming to public transit who didn’t have to have public transit backgrounds, um, primarily on the marketing side, the deve- you know, the economic development side, and really wanted to have a different lens of public transit than those people that came up.

in it. Um, and I, well, I grew up right in the Metro, as it was called then. Um- Mm-hmm … had some familiarity with, with transit in Kansas City. I, I was what you’d call an avid public transit advocate. And when you joined KCATA, uh, that was in a marketing role, correct? Yes. I came on as the chief marketing officer.

Um, the ATA at that time had just done a, a huge rebrand, um, from The Metro to RideKC, whereby they went, they tried to become a regional transit authority over the seven counties and two states. And so they really wanted to emphasize outreach, um, marketing, and all those different things, and telling the story.

And what was that experience like? You know, you’re, you’re obviously a- an advocate before, but now you’re working at the agency and you’re doing those marketing efforts to try to get the, the word out, spread the, the good word about, uh, public transportation. Uh, what was the difference between, you know, the before and the after there? Well, you know, all, all good marketing is storytelling. All good marketing is, you know, trying to eliminate those you don’t want.

And, and transit’s interesting. Um, when you get into it and the true believers, you think this is the greatest thing ever, and, and why don’t people get it? Why don’t they see how awesome public transit is and all the good that it does? However, that’s not how the world works. Um, so we try to focus on really telling the stories, you know, that move people. I try to bring in a lot of data analytics to really say, okay, before we’d, we’d do a campaign and, and we’d spend a lot of money, and pat ourselves on the back and say that worked, but we had no real, no metrics to prove that it worked, that it increased ridership. So we, we introduced a lot of data, a lot, you know, a lot of geofencing, looking at really targeting that narrow, narrow frameworks within different campaigns, specific corridors.

And then we did with all our soft marketing, you know, we tell stories of our operators, good things in transit throughout the region. Um, but to really just try to change that perception. Um, and even then, I was really trying to say that, you know, I think I asked the question to my, my CEO at the time is, “Why don’t we walk around like a, like the 800-pound gorilla that we are? We, we do a lot of great things here. Why don’t, where’s our swag?” And, and so that’s when I started looking at the data, like economic numbers, and, and what the value add was to the region, and that’s really kind of what sparked my thought, which eventually led to all the, all the stuff I did down the line. And it sounds like all that additional work that came thereafter was work that got you to that CEO role.

Uh, how did your understanding of the agency and the influence of KCATA in the Kansas City area, how did that change over time?

You know, the biggest thing that, that, that we had to do, what we di- what we weren’t doing at, when I got there was, we weren’t at the table. And, and what I mean by that is, you got this, this, this bi-state regional transit authority that moves 13, by the time, 16.5 million people, generating this huge economic impact, but no one knew you were there. And so people are making decisions that affect the agency, that affect public transit, and they’re talking about us, but they-

Without us was, was my frustration is how do you make, these decisions and then s- then call us and say, “Well, yeah, what do you guys think?” But then it’s too late.

Um, what I was really bullish about was really making sure that, you know, we were at the table. So for example, the, the Greater KC Chamber of Commerce is a hugely influential organization, and we were, we were a member, but at, like, the lowest level. And when I tried to register to go to functions, no one knew the passwords to the we- to our logins or, or anything. So it was really trying to say, how do we get enga- aged, um, in the, the KC Chamber of Commerce? ‘Cause they had a, a transportation committee that was hugely influential, but it was really most about highways.

It wasn’t talking about transit and all these different things. And so working through these different things, going to places that we probably should have been already but weren’t, um, that’s really what trying to change the perception in how people reacted to the KCATA.

Yeah. And, um… Go ahead. Pu- public transit agencies are just part of the fabric of the community, right? Right. And, um, when you’re operating a public transit agency, there’s so many factors that are outside of your control, right? Because you’re operating this very dynamic environment, and then, like you said, it’s being at the table and coordinated with all the different stakeholders. You cannot, uh, afford not to be at the table because- Right … the consequences could be catastrophic, right? Mm-hmm. Like, when you hear these things down the line and you just have to figure it out, uh, uh, that’s not very strategic. Just figure it out, right? So as, as- Right

… you know, as a, as a CEO, how you can get ahead and, and, you know, uh, better connect with the stakeholders. Um, Frank, you, you often spoke about being brilliant at the basics. What did that mean in the day-to-day operation at, uh, KCATA?

Yeah. So, you know, when I came into the KCATA, I’m coming in to CEO left, um, post, post… Transit had COVID, right? You, you got the COVID dollars. Peop- the ridership’s down, staffing’s down.

You’re really trying to figure out, I think the year before, we only got maybe $2 million of federal money. Um, and so my view was the service delivery was, like, the first, thing you approach. ‘Cause end of the day, you know, what we do is move people, and, and that, that’s, that, you can’t, you can’t run from that. And if you can’t move people, if you can’t be consistent, if you can’t take people where they want to go on time, on task, then why are you there?

And so my thing was let’s focus on the fundamentals of, of what we’re supposed to do, and if we take care of that, then we can go do other things. Otherwise, you’ve got an upside down tree. You have no foundation, and you can’t go and try to do be at the table or eco devo, and they go, “Well, your ridership’s down. You, your bus aren’t on time.” You lose credibility. And so that, the first year, that’s all we focused on was, was, was those things. You know, I’m a, I’m a, I’m a big sports nut and, and, um, Michael Jordan’s my favorite basketball player, and everybody hears about Air Jordan, but they don’t understand that he was Fundamental Jordan before that. Dribble with both hands, played great defense, had great mid-range game, and because he could do those things, he became Air Jordan. So basically because we gotta make sure buses on time, they were clean, they were safe, they were going where they’re supposed to go, then we could try to tackle the other things that I felt transit should be a part of without being asked, “Was that mission creep, or why are you doing it in the first place?” Yeah. Well, very well said. And, and you’re right. It, it, you know, the only way that you can get trust from the community, and they can listen to you, and then you can have a vision, uh, that you’re striving for, is if you’re doing the basics right. Right. Like, i- if the service is showing up, if it’s doing what it’s promising, uh, that it’s going to do, then you can, you know, stack on top of that. But, like, if the foundation is not good, then why would they wanna invest in something that is not getting the, the basis, uh, the basics right? Uh- They’ll take their money away.

Yeah. They’ll, they, they’ll do the opposite. They’ll take your money away. Uh, so, you know, some agencies, part of their challenge is, uh, uh, uh, sometimes, and especially out of COVID, uh, COVID, we saw a lot of agencies dealing with, uh, workforce shortages.

Uh, and, you know, they, they affect the agency many ways. Uh, but, you know, could you tell us a little bit more about how those workforce, uh, workforce shortages affect an agency beyond the bus routes that sometimes need to be e- eliminated or reduced? Yeah. So obviously, as most agencies at the time, we lost a ton of operators, and they retired, took early retirements, or just quite frankly didn’t feel, feel like it was safe to be on the buses.

Um, and, and sometimes, you know, you can be good, and sometimes you just be lucky. Um, I was very fortunate that we had a woman named

June Berry who was in HR, and she’s been there for years, hadn’t really got a shot. Then the previous HR director left, and she goes, “I’ve got these great ideas to get recruit.” And, and, and basically from the operator side and mechanic side, June went old school. You know, going to churches- Uh-huh … putting signs up, going… We looked at reentry programs, all these different things to get people, um, going to the high schools and really trying to get, get the operators together. ‘Cause again, like I said, it was about getting the service on the street, but I can’t put more buses out if I don’t have more operators. I can’t get more buses out if I don’t have enough mec- maintenance guys.

Um, and so we were able to do that and really make, make the impact of getting those drivers. Once we got those operators, um, we got the service on the street.

It didn’t impact us as much on the non-rep side. Um, most people didn’t leave. You know, we obviously had, like, some work from home type things, but, um, if anything, we did do an audit where we kinda looked at how much time a, a, a person spends a day doing their job.

Uh-huh. And we found that they did on average maybe three hours a day of their job. Um, and so we were able to basically say, “Okay, since you only spending three hours a day doing this job- We’re gonna add some more stuff to you ’cause you got, like, five more hours you owe me to do the work. And now I’m not gonna say it was very popular, but I didn’t care ’cause I had a job to do, and, and you’re getting paid to work. And if you’re not gonna get-do the work, then you’re stealing from me. And so they did it. And so we had some people do double duty on some things.

Um, but at the same time, you gotta also have a mission and why you’re doing it. And if people know where you’re going, they’ll follow you. And so it wa- it was a bunch of things at the same time. It was, it was what I call controlled chaos, but we, we saw it through to the performance that was required of the job.

Yeah. And, and that’s difficult, right? Because- Oh, yeah … sometimes you, you, you have to stretch the resources. And, and I find very often, uh, transit agencies and, and operations, uh, around the country, and sometimes organizations in general, as they come up with a new, uh, product, a new idea, the, the, the new service they’re giving to the community, or, you know, they’re, they’re improving their social media presence, and then all these new things, they don’t get no additional resources allocated. So sometimes, you know, you, you have to do with what you have, uh, and stretch it as much as you can, especially during the challenging times. Uh, but sometimes you also have to be mindful of how you’re growing and, like, that the appropriate resources are, uh, being put in place to kinda guarantee or, or, you know, give a good chance of, of, uh, success to the projects that, that you’re endeavoring in.

Um, so, you know, when, when an agency is dealing with immediate pressures, uh, relating to staffing, but also service reliability, funding, how as a, uh, how as a leader do you protect the long, long-term direction, the vision of the agency? So the first thing I did when f- when, the first thing when I came in was, was hire a firm to create a five-year plan. Yeah. And we brought them in, and this thing was… You know, they interviewed staff at the agency, interviewed, you know, stakeholders, um, to really give us a, an idea of where we were gonna go in the next five years. And this is from frontline workers all the way to, to my role as then as the CEO.

Um, we did, we did town halls, um, where I get, where I’d get out there in front of the, you know, the agency and say, “Here’s where, here’s where we’re going, and what this means, um, to not of you as an employee, but to the people that we serve.” I, I was very mission-driven about we’re here’ to serve the people who depend on us, who if we don’t come to work every day, they can’t get to work, church, play, what have you. They don’t get the option of having a bad day, or you don’t have to have a bad day, to prevent people from doing that, ’cause you chose, you chose to come to work in service. And because of that, you’re built different.

And so I was very, I don’t wanna say like a preacher, but really getting out there, showing up, in the bus barn, maintenance bays, offices every day, being first to the office, last to leave, be out in the community telling that story, because you lead from the front. And, and if, and if, and if, if your folks see you’re out there advocating for the agency, advocating for the people that we serve, um, re- recognize them at board meetings, and all the things edifying them, having department celebrations, then they buy into it, and they know it’s gonna be hard. You don’t lie to ’em. You don’t say it’s gonna be easy. You say,

“It’s gonna suck, but we’re gonna lean into it.” Because again, this is the only industry I’ve ever worked in where you can see on a daily basis the impact of what you do. When you see people come up to you, or you get on that bus, ride that system, and they’re, they’re getting where they gotta go, and they’re thanking you for it, or thanking the operators, I’ mean, that, that’s, that’s a d- that’s a different high. And, and, and it’s hard to replicate anywhere else. So you? gotta stay mission driven, but also your, your, your, your folks gotta buy into you as a leader that you’re as committed as they are. This episode is brought to you by ETA. For decades, transit agencies have been locked into legacy CAD/AVL systems built for another era. Expensive upgrades, rigid architectures, and software that lives in server rooms instead of the browser.

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Move forward. The future of CAD/AVL is open. See it at etatransit.com. Absolutely, and I think some of the best leaders are, are the ones who are out there experiencing the, the service. They’re talking to the folks who are using it. Mm-hmm. I, I know, uh, you know,

Christian and I, we, we come from the, the camp of Clinton B. Forbes, and he was- Yes … very much, very much that same way, where you’ve gotta be the one to be the role model. Right. And, uh, it, it sounds like, you know, you, you really took the bull by the horns there and wanted to make sure that, uh, y- you know, when people see you, they, they see a, a strong leader and someone who’s willing to make the sacrifices.

Yeah. I, I didn’t, dress as fancy as Clinton did, though. Oh, not many people do. Um- May he, may he rest in peace.

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. We miss him. Uh, so, uh, you know, KCATA is pretty, uh, unique in that you cover a lot of service area and- Yeah. … across a couple states. Um-

Mm-hmm … how, how did that affect how you were able to set priorities? Because I imagine there were competing priorities, you know, amongst the different states, but also maybe the, the cities that are, you know, s- expanding that service area. Then probably most importantly, Frank, the funding. Uh- Yeah … how does that even work?

You know, it, it’s, it’s, it’s interesting that the, uh, the ATA was created by a compact that was based on the Port Authority of New York/New Jersey. So on paper, there’s this immense amount of power, but they just, they did not give us the power to levy taxes.

So you basically have an unfunded mandate, unfortunately. Um, and so f- so it really is about You know, state money, federal monies, municipalities.

Kansas City, Missouri is unique in that it has two dedicated taxes for public transit, but the rest of your city deal with– you’re basically dealing with contracts.

Um, and so you might go to Kansas City, Kansas, and they’ll– you’ll do a contract with Kansas City, Kansas, Johnson

County. Then you have your smaller city contracts, which is a not the best way to do business because you build– you’re trying to use contracts every year. And then these smaller cities, it’s all about their budget. So one year they have this much, one year they have that much or not that much. And so really, it’s unfortunate that, um, for the most of ATA’s history, they were content to be a bus company and, and just run the metro and kind of ignore the region, even though they’re a regional transit authority. Like I said, when I got hired, they had just done a rebrand for RideKC, where basically Johnson

County, Wyandotte County all came back in-house under, this brand to really gear towards, hopefully by this time, a regional funding prod-product.

Um, that did not happen for a host of reasons. Um, one thing I tried to do was really start just having the conversations, uh, with

Johnson County, Wyandotte County. We actually increased service, um, in, in KCK. We actually started getting s- getting multi-year contracts with some of these municipalities. Um, we tried to become kind of the greater regional chamber of transit, and start to do things kind of à la carte to different services with the intent. Um, we did a regional summit in 2025.

Uh, we brought in, uh, Randy Clark from WMATA ’cause they were doing something very, similar in the DMV area, and we patterned it after that. And according to Randy, it was– we had more people at our first meeting than they, did. And so there was, there was an impetus with the World Cup coming to really try to figure out how do we, how do we break these barriers down. But when you got a state line and elected officials, it’s complicated.

Um, we were making headway and progress at the time, but since I’ve left eight months ago, I can’t speak to what they’re doing now. But, um, we did make the push and effort to build those relationships, um, and really try to leverage the power. We really tried to leverage the, the federal power of the

KCATA to bring resources back to the region a-and, and leverage our, our, our compact powers, which had some effect. It was very successful. But again, um, I like– I’d like to think they’re still doing it at the ATA, but I-I’m, I’m not privy to what their plans are. You know, when you get a new CEO, things always change. Right. Absolutely.

Um, a-and why do you think it’s been so difficult to establish more sustainable funding for the Kansas City area? Um, honestly, they, they never really tried.

It was, it was kinda like the path of least resistance. And, uh, and, and unfortunately, you know, if you read the Federal Compact, and when I first came 10 years ago to the ATA, that’s the first thing I grabbed. I was fascinated by it. And to think, I mean, this thing’s a district. The ATA is. a district. I mean, if you think about it, it, is, it is a quasi-federal district. It has no boundaries. It can do all these really, really neat things, uh, from economic development to housing, all these cool tools. But no one ever thought to really use it to leverage for the good of the region, um, because honestly, it’s, it’s hard work, um, to get out there. And that’s why they created the CEO, role in 2015, was to– that job was to go out there and be that evangelist, that cheerleader, that, that, that bridge builder, um, to bring the region together. And I, I do believe in the work that we did in the four years I was the CEO.

Um, we really, really pushed, and I think we’re going, we were going in the right direction, um, from, you know, b- leveraging all the tools from the TOD to the federal monies to, to the state monies.

Um, leveraging federal grants for positions in the, in, in, in agencies. Helping grants pay for positions for smaller cities. Um, like I said, multi-year contracts. But that’s a lot of work. And, and, and I just don’t believe historically the, the effort was there. Credit to the board in 2013 for recognizing that and re-reorgan-re-reorganization to do so.

Um, but I think it was the closest we got to it under my tenure with the team I had built. But again, I, I’m not sure if they’re still as passionate about it as they were when I was there. And I, and I don’t say that to slight. I don’t, I just don’t know

’cause I, I really don’t, I don’t delve into to the past too much, so. Sure. Understandable. You know, you said something there that, uh, I w- I wasn’t expecting. So that reorganization that happened in 2013, if I heard you correctly-

Yes … did, did you say that there was not a CEO before that? It was a general manager. Oh, it was a general manager type of thing. It was, it was- So more operationally? Yeah, exactly. It was a, it was a, a general manager, and they were a damn good bus company. But then the board recognized that with this compact authority, that we didn’t have regional, a regional funding mechanism or, or really a regional transit authority.

And so there was a huge push. This is when the streetcar line was coming on, on board, and there was a lot of enthusiasm for the whole RideKC region. Johnson County, who’d been gone for 32 years, came back to the fold. Wyandotte came in. Um, there was a window, I would say, to, um, really– if there was a, a time it could’ve really been done easily, that was the window, that two, three-year window after that. Um, so I don’t think the, uh, constant resources have gone away. It’s just, it’s just a heavy lift, man. And, and so you gotta have a special person that really wants to accept that responsibility and lean into it and take on the challenge.

Um, I did. My team did. I had great people. We bought into it. And, and luckily for the ATA, most of them are still there.

Um, so it’s, it’s up to whoever the next CEO they bring in has that same commitment, and we’ll see. In, in your four years in the CEO role, what was your technique or techniques, if you had many, to be able to build consensus amongst all of these, you know, different organizations and entities?

Um, you know, m- my thing is I, I try to keep the ATA, uh, high above, if that makes sense. And, and, like, look, we’re not, we’re… we don’t have jurisdictions, we don’t have, you know, tribes. We’re just the ATA, and we’re here to move people. At the end of the day, you gotta move people through, and how do we do it together? You know, I tried to focus on the commonalities. If it… I mean, there were challenges.

You’re dealing with elected officials, you know, you’re dealing with egos, some stupidity, um, and lack of understanding of how, how transit works. But it’s your job to educate, and, and, and inform, and, and be a consensus builder, and, and understand. And I led with numbers. I mean, I looked at the data to say, okay, you’re, you know… like, for example, North Kansas City, you know, they have a population about 5,000 that live there, but during the day, 11,000 people run through there, and they’re using transit. And so we’re trying to get them to invest more in transit, and, and so we talk about what the economic impact was if you had less transit versus what you had more transit.

And as an elected official, that, that resonated. That, oh, we could bring this much more to our city if we made this investment. So I talked in, in, in the language of pro formas, capital stacks, ROI, tax revenue, that they would understand.

Um, and, and we, we took the, the transit discussion away from, man, they’re here to take our money, to well, well, why. If we invest, we get more in return. I think data is the, the best, uh, tool when it comes to painting the picture for elected officials a- and stakeholders altogether. And, and I commend you for what you said. I think that generally, uh, you know, I hear, uh, folks around the country, we, we use a, it, the statistics from APTA and, and the statement about the investment in public transit, right? That it used to be, as I recall, every dollar invested into public transit, um, you know, you get $5 back in economic return. Yep. And I think now they said the number is $6 in economic return.

It, it’s even grown more. But, uh, we leave it at that high level, and then being able to bring it more at the local level and show them that ROI in terms of access to jobs and, you know, the impacts of the economy. Because, you know, the, the public transit system costs money and, and they see the money going out. Paying for the fuel, paying for the drivers, paying for the staff. And, and there’s not really money coming in into a transit agency. There’s a few revenue sources that are put in place, uh, one of those being the fares.

A- and fares, in general, uh, I think a benchmark in, you know, that, that I’ve heard about, uh, farebox recovery, uh, rate is, is about 15 to 17%, um, nationwide. You know, there’s some agencies in the very high end, there’s agencies that are way below 10%.

Um, you know, I wanna talk about that because finances a- in the, um, health of a, you know, the, the budget and, and the, the finances of a transit agency is one of the challenges executive directors or CEOs have to deal with. Uh, I understand Kansas City’s, uh, Kansas City experience fare free, and I would i- I would imagine this was a little bit after

COVID, uh, like a- many agencies did. Could you tell me a little bit of what you guys learned when you went fare free, the reason why you went fare free, and, you know, what happened with the ridership, the safety aspect, and, and those finances as we were just speaking about how important funding is? Yeah. So our, our

CEO, when I interviewed, uh, back in 2016, was talking about fare free, um, throughout the region. And of course, again, I’m, I’m ignorant of all the transit stuff, so I’m like, “Okay, that sounds cool. Whatever.”

Um, but once I got grips with stuff, so we tried doing, like, veterans ride for free. Um, we might do a school program where kids ride for free. Um, the difference was, though, the VA would pay for veterans passes, so they’d reimburse us at a discounted rate for the pass, then we’d get the vets a free pass. So there was some revenue generation- Uh-huh … to cover the cost.

Um, then we had our new BRT Prospect MAX come online in 2019. The discussion was maybe to go fare free for six months to kind of beta test it, see what it would look like. You know, there were discussions of s- farebox issues, security, all these things, but we didn’t really test it. You know, we didn’t really get the data to say, okay, what’s good or bad. And then our CEO just made a blanket decision, honestly, to just say, “We’re gonna go fare free across the region.” And this was right, this was a little before COVID, and we’re like, “Okay, sure.” And then

COVID comes, and then we get this pile of money because, honestly, had we not gotten the money from, from, from the COVID dollars, there’d be no free fare program, ’cause it was, we wasn’t, we couldn’t afford it. I mean, that was, that’s the real, that’s the real, um- So it, it, it did happen during COVID? Like, COVID was the, the, the, the one thing that, you know, pushed you into fare free service? COVID covered the cost. So- But were you, were you operating fare free before

COVID? For about six, seven months in 2019. And the fare free we had before Christian, was VA pays for passes, we gave them away for free. Oh, okay. I get it. So, so it was some sort of a discounted pass. Yes. So those people are traveling, but in a way it’s being subsidized- Yes … like, by different revenue sources. Not like you were operating-

No … open fare free payment, everybody free. It was just you started- No … with those programs. No, sir. Free fare is not free. And, and, and so- That’s so true … so we did it and, and, and I, I will say in, in full disclosure, I was one of the few that was against it. And not, not philosophically, um, I understood why it would be a benefit, but my question was very pretty pragmatic. ‘Cause who pays for it?

Right. You know, who pays for it? And, you know, have we talked to, have we talked to the local union? Have we talked- To, to the staff. And we talked to anybody about this, we just did it. Um, so there, so it wasn’t like we were trying to get learnings from it. It was just, it sounded cool, and, you know, we did it, and we used, um, you know, ARPA dollars, federal dollars to cover the, the total cost of, of the fare program.

The city of Kansas City paid some of the fare box, but it wasn’t just the fare box, it was, it was the fact that when we’d went fare-free, and I wasn’t, I wasn’t in leadership then to even have an impact on this, so it was basically, you say we’re gonna do free fare, but you don’t c- you don’t, you don’t consider paratransit cost.

You don’t consider security cost. You don’t consider the cost of replacing windows and damages and all these different things. So what seems like on the surface a pretty sweet deal, all of a sudden, when you’re paying 52 bucks a trip for paratransit, now it’s free, and y- y- you, people taking, instead of taking four trips a day, they’re taking eight to 10. That adds up. And as the co- as, as COVID comes out and the COVID money dwindles, now you got a problem because you’re looking at a good

20 to $30 million cost that’s been covered by the feds, and it’s going away. Now what are you gonna do? And that’s what I walked into when I became

CEO. Yeah. And, and how do you manage, uh, the, the public, right? Because to your point, like there’s some price elasticity there, right? Like, how much would, you know, at a given price, people take more or less of a service.

Right. And, you know, the moment that you make it free, I mean, you know, the demand goes up. People wanna take more frequent trips. Mm. They’re not, you know, keeping cost in mind. And, and you see a lot of the folks that ride paratransit, even though it’s also heavily subsidized, if they’re paying per trip $5, $3, and, and it’s maybe seniors on a fixed income, like they’re mindful of their amount of trips. They’re more- Right … strategic about how they travel.

Yes. The moment you make it free, now they don’t have to be thinking about it so much. It, it, it- Oh, no … but then the problem is, is when you have to dial it back again, and you go to the public and says,

“You know that, that you really enjoyed having free, you know, services? Uh, well, that’s going away.” So, so, you know, could you tell me a little bit of w- how do you manage that, or how do you get to that point? And also, what’s your perspective when it comes to fares in relationship to the service that is being provided? You know, for-

That’s a good one … the reliability, the frequency. Yeah. Is there a case for actually increasing the fare, in your mind? Well, I, you know, for that question, if you, if we charged what the, what the service really costs, nobody would ride the bus. Yeah. Right? I mean, let’s just, let’s just be real here.

I mean, and, and that was, that was a problem because, you know, you walk into something… And I, look, I blame nobody if all of a sudden that trip that costs you five bucks is free, and they’re coming to your door, and they go where you wanna go.

Hell, I, I, I totally understood exactly why people went from four trips to 10. Before it was like, “Well, I gotta make sure

I gotta go to my, my doctor, my pharmacy, I gotta go to the grocery store, then I can go home.” Now it’s like, “Oh, I forgot to go to the doctor. Just pick up the phone and call.”

So I wanna be very clear. I, we, we weren’t mad at anybody for doing what they did, ’cause they’re human. Everybody would’ve done it. It was just like, we can’t sustain this anymore, and we’re watching… And, and my, my frustration with it was you never make a long-term policy on short-term money.

COVID, it showed a lot of h- a lot of dumb people in transit. Instead of using that money to invest in legit capital projects that you could, you could make for long-term benefit, we want…

Some people went to gimmicks. I thought the free fare was a gimmick because we had no plan to make it long-term. And I, I thought, I personally thought it was cruel to say, “Here you go.

Let’s snatch it back.” I just thought it was messed up. But I was the CEO, and I, and I, I was paid to make the tough choices, ’cause the money just wasn’t there, Christian. I mean, we couldn’t do it. Right. I mean, we were at a point where we’re, we’re gonna have to decide, do we start taking big shroud budget money to cover paratransit costs?

Because we have to cover paratransit costs ’cause it’s, it’s a federal program. You have to, you have to honor it at what cost to service.

So we conducted a study with Olson about what it would look like to go back to fares. I mean, we went, you know, we did the whole community outreach.

You know, we, we’ve looked at other ind- other agencies. We looked at what types of, you know, fare box systems to use, all those different things. Um, and it’s about a year-long process to really said, okay, to the board, here’s all the data.

Because we, I mean, the, we’re, we’re gonna go back to something ’cause the money just wasn’t there. The, the feds weren’t gonna fund that, like, that way ever again, and I hope to God I never have to do it ’cause it’s a crisis, and our local funders just didn’t have the money to sustain it. And unfortunately, for a lot of people that don’t understand transit, just regular folks, they assume that pa- transit have this pile up, this endless, bottomless pit of money, and we just go do it, and it doesn’t work that way. We have, we’re forced to make hard decisions every day

’cause we only have so much capital to do these different things. And so, um, we put a plan together, an implementation plan, a re-entry plan.

Um, you know, we brought back all the wraparound services, like I said before, that would pay for passes. What we did this time that we didn’t have before was we had a low-income plan for people to get fare free. So now you could be means tested.

You made a certain amount of money, you could get free bus passes. So we were very cognizant of, of, of people and their situations, um, and trying to make sure that the landing was as soft as possible. I think the fare would end up being $2, and I think they brought them back in June, June,

June of this year Um, you know, like they work with the United Way, the veterans, um, the city, and, and so, um, it, it was… I won’t say it was fun because, you know, you go to board meetings, and you’re getting called everything but a child of God ’cause you’re bringing fares back. But quite frankly, we weren’t in a position to keep going fare-free, and it w- it was just that simple. And at that point, the union had become, had once been supporters were basically anti, you know, fare-free just ’cause of, of the, the rider profile changes, which is just, just true, that we had a different rider profile, and they noticed it as operators and, and so, you know, we did it. Um, I, I am, I think there should be some sort of fare just because, even if it’s 25 cents, I think the fare is a governor of behavior. I think it allows you to say, “Okay,

I’m getting on this bus. I’m going somewhere.” Uh, I think free fare devalued our… I felt it devalued our service and w- in, in our perception to the community because I view public transit at the same level of the firefighters and police officers, but the perceptions are way different. And when you give things away, you know, we can’t go below free.

You have nothing else to give away. And if we’re gonna say our operators are professionals, and we’re professionals, and we’re here, and we provide a, a service and a, a value add, we can’t be giving stuff away. Yeah. A- and, and that was very strategic, uh, the way that you guys tr- tried to s- um, soften the blow, you know, when, when people are paying fares again. I mean, they were paying fares before, and it’s heavily subsidized. Mm-hmm. Like, it’s not, you know, like to your point, that you’re passing all the cost to the rider, and it’s like, “Rider, pay, you know, $60 for this paratransit trip.”

Mm. Or, you know, like fixed route rider, you know, give us $15 to get on the bus. It, it’s everybody’s paying, you know, kinda like that nominal, uh, contribution, but you know, it has to also feel like you’re, you’re, you’re contributing, right? Like, it, it- Right … has to hurt a little bit, right? So we all value, uh, the service that we have. But it’s, it’s certainly, that’s one of the toughest things, uh, it rolls as, as a CEO and leaders o- of an organization, is leading to those challenges. But most importantly, it’s communicating with the different stakeholders. Mm-hmm. Like, from the riders, from the drivers, and like you said, like the unions, all these groups are, uh, very important to communicate with, and they’re not gonna be happy all the time because everybody want, you know, has their own agenda, and their, you know, um, the way they think about how things should be carried out, and, you know, not everybody’s at the same, uh, place all the time. So

I wanna, uh, uh, ask you, what did you learn about, uh, you know, communicating those trade-offs and navigating those challenges to your stakeholders? Uh, uh, what, what, what do you, you know, recommend of, to any other CEO or person that is in a position similar to the, the one that you were in? I would, I would say lead with extreme transparency and, and, and, and just say, “Here’s how the, like, here’s how transit works, y’all. Here is Transit

101. Here’s how we’re funded. Here’s where the money goes. Here’s how it’s done.” And I would have my CFO either with me or would, or put something together and say, “Guys, there ain’t, there ain’t no money here. This is what it is. Here’s the chart. Here’s where we’re showing this, this federal funding going down. Here’s where we are. You know, we’re coming out of, you know, inflationary environment out of COVID, so gas costs more, fuel costs more. All these things cost more. If you’re in, you know, you guys come from, from transit, so you understand that the, the labor cost, the fixed labor cost, that’s gonna be, what,

70, 90% of your, of your budget, right? And, and, and unions, God bless them, they never give anything back, and and they will die on a, they will die on the vine to protect their interests, which is their, that’s what they’re supposed to do. But that’s the real of what we operate in. And so when I had community advocates saying, “Well, we want 15-minute headways through all bus routes, and we want all the buses free, and we want the, we want the union guys to get their raise,” I’m like, “Those are all contradictory.”

It doesn’t work that way. And, and so we tried to really be truthful. Not tried, we were very truthful in, in the, how this thing operates to the point where I even said, “Look, if we know we got 32 routes, and we know 82% of the people that ride, 15 of them, why not make these 15 routes really, really good, and then fill the rest with microtransit bleeding into the bus system?”

Oh, I got killed. But I, I thought from a pragmatism, it made the most sense- Yeah … just from an operations perspective. But

I realized that we, you know, sometimes you don’t work in the sensible world in transit, and that’s, that’s one of the limitations because you’re not allowed as a transit authority or agency to sometimes work in the best interest of the agency and sometimes the best interest of the people because they don’t understand how it really works. So Frank, in, in, in your time at, uh, KCATA, you’re a proponent of, uh, transit-oriented development and, uh, you know, my understanding, uh, based on the little bit of research we’ve done, you, you’re a big proponent of KCATA playing a part in that.

Uh, w- why, why is that so? Why do you think that the, you know, transit and this urban planning, uh, these urban planning projects and initiatives, uh, should be grouped together? Well, because transit intersects them all. It intersects housing, healthcare, employment, education, economic development, infrastructure. No matter where you go, that’s where transit is. Um, and I may,

I may, I may have this backwards. If I do, I do apologize, but I be- I believe the Department of Transportation was pulled from the Department of Housing, or one of the two, but they were together initially, housing and transportation. And so when in our compact, um, it was designed to move people, goods, and services across, across state lines with the ability to do economic development as far as bond financing, eminent domain, land, land management, and sales tax exemption on construction materials.

So our compact was designed to that nexus of development, um, because if you build a, a, say a corridor, a bus corridor, a rail corridor, where are people going to get off the bus or the rail? Where are they living?

Where are they, where are they, where are they buying from? Where are they going to church? Um, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s placement building. It’s saying, if I can take housing costs in Kansas City, Missouri at the time, housing and transportation costs are almost 50% of someone’s budget. Now, if I can knock off half of that in transit, say 25%, now put that back into your pocket or back into the economy, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s urban planning at its best ’cause it’s efficient and it makes sense. And it also, housing on TOD lines is really more affordable. Um, and so it’s really about the nexus of, okay, we said, all right, we’re gonna do this.

And since we started the program in 2022, started 2019, but first part of 2022, we’ve done over half a billion dollars, or we did half a billion dollars in, in investments for projects, over 600,000 new riders, 4,000 new jobs.

So we’re building around, and we only focused where, where transit was, on transit corridors or where transit are gonna go. And it was really about efficiency, but also at its core, we could create operational funds that we got to keep. So when you talk about funding issues, funding challenges, TOD allows an agency, if they do it right, to create their own revenue that’s operational, that belongs to no one but that agency.

So through our fees and things, we’re probably over the next 20 years, and I say we, I’m not there anymore, um, ATA’s probably gonna get another 20 to $25 million in operational fees over the course of the life of these projects, and they’re not done.

And so for me, it made the most sense because it all, it all ties in together because transit ties into all of it. So why not do it? ‘Cause you’re right in the middle of it anyway. Yeah. It m- it makes a lot of sense. And, and, and that’s part of the challenge of, uh, being in that role, right? A- and knowing that, uh, you have a perspective. You’re, you’re holding the agenda of the agency, the vision, the mission, and you try to further that or accomplish that, but you, you have to play in the sandbox with everybody else. So I, I wanted to ask you from your role as CEO, uh, some of the lessons that you learned.

Uh, what did leading KCATA teach you about the actual authority and limitations of a transit CEO? Because you don’t get to do whatever you want, or you just go ahead and do it, right? As, as you were just explaining. So w- anything else- Well- … that you learned when it comes to that? I, I, I, I learned that you can be a really, really good CEO and still lose your job. That’s what

I learned. That, that’s a joke. Um, No, I mean- It happens. It happens. No. But, but really you find that you can have really great ideas, but you catch the wrong board, the wrong elected official, and, and your, and your agenda stops.

Now, we were able to do the TOD at ATA where only because our previous CEO basically had me and a guy named Brian Starner- Mm-hmm … create a separate corporation off campus.

And the HGA basically contracted us to go do TOD for the KCATA. And then, so we were never like officially a part of the KCATA. We were, and that’s how we did it. When I became the CEO,

I brought it in-house ’cause it made more sense for resource and, and redundancies. Um, but they’re not, they’re not apart. They’re, they’re… It makes sense. If you look at history of America, where the trains came, all the commerce came.

And so, you know, you build a, a KC Mo is a city built for transit. It’s 81 square miles and it’s riddled with square footage. Um, it’s very dense and it’s, it’s very walkable, and that’s what you’re seeing people going to.

But again, if, if, if you, if you don’t, if you catch the wrong board, wrong board chair, wrong somebody, you kinda, you kinda stop. And transit’s the only industry I worked in where really good CEOs lose their jobs, but they’re really good CEOs.

It’s just circumstances out of beyond their control, um, get ’em. So the, my big thing I learned about it was if I ever did it again, which I probably won’t, but if I ever did, it’s gotta be like the perfect locus of, you know, board, funding, mayors, city council. I mean, you have to look at that stuff because when you first get the job, you’re just stoked to get the job.

Then you get in and go, “Oh, I can’t do that. I can’t do this.” In private sector as CEO, you’ve got a lot more latitude. You still got a board, but you can go out and do things, and you don’t have to worry about, you know, the community activists, the transit, the transit heads, the, the sunrise groups, and all these different things because you’re allowed to go do what you gotta do. But these groups have impacts on elected officials and all these things. And so, um,

I, I learned that, you know, you don’t have the control that you probably ought to have. And, and, and God bless those who take on the role of CEO ’cause it’s, it’s thankless, but it’s, it’s necessary and it’s crucial to have the best people you can in these roles that are thinking about things the right way.

Um, because again, the riders don’t care. They just want the bus to be on time, and they want it to be clean, and it’s safe for the train to be on time.

And they don’t care about this other foolishness, but unfortunately we get caught up into that foolishness, um, to the detriment of the people that we’re supposed to serve. That’s very well said, Frank.

Uh, you left KCATA, uh, eight months ago. Mm-hmm. And since then you’ve been busy. Uh, and now you- I’m sure you’re taking all those learnings and, uh, you know, applying those to your practice advisors group.

Mm-hmm. Um, that, that consulting business. Um, can you, uh, tell our listeners what it is that you do there specifically and how you’re able to help transit agencies or city leaders who- Yeah … might be looking for your advice? Um, you know, when I, I left the ATA and, and, and I didn’t wanna leave transit, you know. I, I have… It’s funny, when I, when I got to ATA, I said I’d do it for two years, then go do something else. Here

I am 10 years later, still in transit. I think once you kinda get the, you have that proverbial drink the Kool-Aid moment, and you become a, a passionate believer in what public transit can do, right? It changes lives, all these different things. So I didn’t wanna leave transit. I knew that. Um, I met some of the finest people in transit. Um, they’re good people, care a lot, super talented. And now the question was, how do I stay a part of it, but maybe not in the, in the agency leader capacity? Um, and so my thought was, okay, I had people calling me saying, “Hey, I got a question about TOD,” or,

“Can you help me with this or do that?” And I was like, well, you know, I can make, make some money off this, and not have a board answer to anymore. This’d be kinda great. This’d be kinda nice.

And, uh, so I fr- created Praxis, and, and, and Praxis means from theory to, uh, theory to execution. It’s, it’s a Greek word.

And I found that too often in transit, and you guys probably had this experience, when you talk to consultants and things, they, they talk good, but they’ve never really done it. And they want you to pay a lot of money, but they don’t know if it’s gonna work or not. And so I thought, okay, I’ve done it. I’ve sat in the seat, I’ve been a CEO, I’ve been in transit for 10 years. I know how to do this stuff. And I said, let me focus on what I know, which is, you know, mobility transformation, you know, route changes, you know, TNCs, how do we, what’s coming on in, in the mobility side, the TOD side, which I’ve done projects for and I believe in. And then what I call just executive intelligence, meaning how do we, how can you do advisory work? How can you help CEOs or just any translator make really good decisions, um, and ex- exercise good judgment? Because the CEO role is, is a lonely role. It’s very isolating, and I don’t think, I think we hire these people and then say, “Okay, good luck. Go do it,” instead of saying, “Okay, where’s that, where’s that advice?

Where’s that person to help me do this?” I was fortunate. I, I hired a woman named Carolyn Flowers. I actually talk to her today. Um, that was four years ago, but we still talk to this day, to advise me through situations that I just didn’t understand ’cause I never experienced it before.

And so what I try to do with, with people in transit is to use what I’ve learned, uh, to offer not only the advisement piece, but also on the practical piece of, if we’re gonna do this TOD project, we can do an assessment for you, and I advise what that does. Um, if you want to, we can ta- I’ve got a team of folks, we can go and actually create a whole TOD program.

Um, I’m working with, with a, with a company right now, I can’t announce it yet, but once it’s done, it’s gonna be a pretty big deal on the mobility side. Um, and then also on, on, on the intelligence piece, we look at AI as a tool.

I work with a company out of San Francisco right now that’s looking at predict, uh, preventative safety measures, um, on the Vision Zero space and, and how, how AI can be an intelligence, um, supporter of that. So I’m trying to stay involved in things I think are the future of what transit does, but also to stay on the practical side and just use what I’ve learned to, to benefit transit.

And hopefully, I stepped out of the transit seat to have a broader impact in the transit and industry and try to advise those, um, who don’t have that experience. Frank, what gives you the most satisfaction about leading Praxis Advisors Group? I get to solve problems without people in my way. Um, that’s, I mean, I’m, I’m just gonna shoot you guys straight. It’s, it’s be able to sit there and go, I get to try to help people find solutions and not be bound by the board, the city. Now, now let me very clear, I also know when I give that advice, I have been in that person’s seat. So I understand they don’t just, they can’t just go do it ’cause I say so. But

I’m very aware of the, the board pressures, the civic pressures, the new side pressures, the federal pressures. Um, so I take that experience and say, okay, based on what we know, here’s what we can do. Um, I can use my relationships to advocate for them in a way that they cannot specifically. So I can go talk to an elected official over a beer and say, “Okay, let’s talk about this situation,” and then bring that back and, and give a different perspective that I don’t, they can’t do. And so, um, the satisfaction comes in solving people’s problems and, and, and really keeping them in transit, ’cause we have to keep, we have to keep these folks in transit. And, and so part of what I do is, it’s a little thing I can do, is try to help keep people in transit by helping them make good decisions and exercise sound judgment. Um, and hopefully don’t make the mistakes that put them out of transit. Yeah, that, that, that’s really good. And, and, um, you know, Frank, I, I know CEOs, they seek advice constantly from fellow CEOs in, in other communities and other regions of the country because, you know, again, you’re trying to speak with people that live the same reality, that are in a- Mm-hmm … in a challenging environment.

And like you said, the top is very lonely and, you know, there’s high expectations and, uh, and know very limited resources, and you, you, you have to be able to navigate that. And h- having the opportunity to reach out to somebody or partner with, with an organization that provides services where, you know, you’re being, um, you know, kinda like supported by somebody that was in your shoes, that actually went through those challenges and, and like to your point, help navigate the, all the different stakeholders, all those elected officials and board members, because you pretty much have to gauge, uh, you know, where they’re at, uh, and how they stand against, you know, any project or policy that is coming up. And then how could you navigate, you know, getting them or persuade them to come to your side? Like, to understand your, the purpose and the project and, and kinda help you push forward. So, uh- Right … I think that’s, that’s definitely a remarkable and, and much needed service, uh, for, uh, transit leaders around the country. Uh, Frank, we’re coming close to the end of our, uh, podcast. Uh, I wanna, you know, again, thank you for joining us. Uh, we’re gonna go through this segment. This is a fun segment.

Uh, it’s called the Rapid Fire, and pretty much we’re gonna be throwing questions at you, uh, you know, short questions, short answers, and, uh, it should be fun. So you ready for it?

Okay. Yep. Excellent. Favorite transit system? So that’s, that’s not a trick question. You know it’s the KCATA. Excellent. Most important quality in a transit CEO? Judgment. All right, judgment.

One metric every agency leader should watch. On time performance. 100%. Uh, one thing elected officials misunderstand about operating transit.

They don’t understand that transit is infrastructure. All right. That’s a pretty good one. Uh, best advice for someone preparing to lead a public agency, especially the first time walking into that role. Build your team you. All right.

That, that’s that’s a good, uh, piece of advice. So I’ll pass it on to Levi. Levi, you have some key takeaways ready for us? Absolutely I do. Those were, those were great, and as Christian said, thank you, Frank, for joining us on the podcast today. It’s been, really been a lot of fun, and- The only thing that sucks is we’re not in Boca

Raton. Right. Um, so you know, I did come up with a few key takeaways.

Um, tried to keep it fairly succinct here, but Frank, you tell me if you would change the wording on any of these, or if I got any of these completely wrong. Uh, but the first one I wrote down is get a seat at the table. Uh, you need to have your voice heard as a transit agency. One thing I really liked that you said was focus on the mission, and sometimes your decisions are not going to be the popular ones, but you’ve gotta make them because it’s, it’s a part of the mission that you’re trying to accomplish with your team.

Right. Uh, the third one I wrote down was leading with transparency and presenting your arguments with data, especially to board members or to, uh, folks in the community when, when they wanna know that you’re, you’re being transparent and that you’re, you’re thinking these things through. So, uh, I really like that comment.

Uh, the other one that you said, which, you know, might be a bit spicy, but I, I really like it. You said COVID dollars were spent on some gimmicks. We kind of went with the things that would maybe be splashy and get some attention in the short term, but- Right … not really benefit riders in the long term. And finally, Frank, you said transit is infrastructure. Now, that, that was in the rapid fire, um, not in, you know, the more interview style, but, uh, you know, I think that is an important point, that it is infrastructure for our communities, uh, nationwide. So, uh, you know, again, Frank, this has been a really terrific conversation. You have a lot of experience, and it’s, it’s clear that you care. And

I, I, I think sometimes, you know, leaders might get in there, and they, they spend some time, and it’s like, ah, you know, let’s just run the business as usual. You don’t strike me as a business as usual type of guy. So, uh- No … I think you’re, you’re unique in that sense. Um, you know, just to wrap up here, Frank, you know, we’ve, we’ve talked about Praxis Advisors

Group, uh, and what, that work that you’re doing there. I know that’s important work. Can you give our listeners a way to be able to follow that work, follow you, see what you’re up to? Maybe you have special-

Yeah … projects or programs that they can be- Um, … become involved in. There’s two ways. Um, follow me on LinkedIn, Frank White III, that’s pretty simple. Um, and then our website is www.praxisadvisorsgroup.com.

Excellent. And I’m also- Go again … shameless plug before we go. I’m in the process with my, while my daughter is here today, we’re wrapping up the details on a, a coaching program for new CEOs.

So look out for that too. Okay, excellent. Yeah, that, that sounds pretty promising. Uh, so this would be new CEOs that, uh, may be new to transit, and- Yeah, new to transit.

Um- Mm-hmm … that’s, I think that’s probably the biggest gap we’re seeing. I mean, ’cause I mean, think about, like, look at some of the really good CEOs that have left the industry in like their

40s and 50s. They have a lot to still give, myself included, but then they’re not coming back, myself included, because they, and they, I mean, but they leave transit entirely. You know, Nadine Lee’s gone to academia, I mean, and she was super talented.

Um, or they just burn out and say, you know, they’ll… You know, I’m, I’m glad we didn’t talk about boards today ’cause I got a whole thing on boards.

So, um- That’ll be the next conversation, Frank. Yeah, that, that’ll, that’ll be- We’ll bring you back … that’ll be an offline conversation about boards and their behavior. All right. Well, yeah, so audience, uh, keep a, an eye out for that CEO or new transit

CEO program that you have going on. Again, this has been a wonderful conversation. It’s been great. Really appreciate it. And again, thank you to our listeners for tuning in to another episode of Stop Requested. We’ll be back next week.