The MBTA petitioned federal transit regulators Friday for more time to complete a list of corrective actions — including an agency-wide staffing analysis — they are taking in the wake of an investigation into the Massachusetts agency that was prompted by a string of safety failures.
In a letter obtained by the Herald, a top MBTA official cited track “safety actions” and a major personnel shift announced last week that divided the agency into four different divisions as the reason for needing an extension for some plans they submitted to the Federal Transit Agency.
“As you will see, there are some broad but relatively minor shifts requested across specific action items in many of the (corrective action plans) for whom our stakeholders have had to focus on (right of way) safety policies and procedures in the immediate short term, preventing us from progressing on other (corrective action plan) actions,” MBTA Chief of Quality, Compliance, and Oversight Meredith Sandberg wrote in a letter to the FTA.
Sandberg said there were “more significant shifts requested for dates” found in a plan to hire a consulting agency to complete an MBTA-wide workforce assessment.
The assessment includes an analysis of staffing levels required to support “mission critical activities,” the T’s ability to support those activities with current staffing levels, and a risk assessment and mitigation strategy for gaps between current and required staffing levels, according to a publicly available copy of the plan.
MBTA officials expected the entire plan to cost roughly $3.9 million and initially estimated the full assessment would be presented to the board by Dec. 31.
But Sandberg said the MBTA needs some leeway.
“For this work, the organizational shifts, in addition to redoubled efforts to solicit input and feedback on that work deeply and broadly across the organization, necessitate a more significant delay in submitting deliverables that are accurate and helpful to the authority in building the right sized and skilled workforce,” Sandberg wrote in the letter to FTA Chief Safety Officer Joe DeLorenzo.
MBTA spokesman Joe Pesaturo did not answer a series of questions about the letter, including a potential updated timeline for the staffing assessment, in a statement sent Friday night.
“With the safety of riders and employees its top priority, the MBTA continues to work closely with the FTA on these corrective action plans,” Pesaturo said in the statement to the Herald.
A spreadsheet of the proposed date changes shows the MBTA wants roughly six months more to present the workforce assessment to the MBTA Board of Directors — from Dec. 31 to June 2024, according to a copy obtained by the Herald.
Comments on the spreadsheet also point directly to MBTA General Manager Phillip Eng’s staff reorganization as causing “major changes and delays,” particularly for the risk assessment, and a series of recent action letters from the FTA that “will increase time to complete” the workforce assessment, according to the copy obtained by the Herald.
“The MBTA re-org creates major changes and delays,” the spreadsheet said. “The re-org is also still in flux and the stakeholders and their roles and responsibilities have not been finalized.”
A spokesperson for the FTA did not respond to a request for comment.
Eng announced the personnel shakeup last week, restructuring the agency into four divisions — operations, safety, capital, and administration — and shuffling around top leadership.
The reorganization was necessary to “empower employees with decision making authority that I believe will foster the necessary stability and continuity our workforce is looking for,” Eng said.
At the Thursday board meeting, Eng and other officials touted 1,002 new hires this year, and in the Friday letter, Sandberg said the workforce assessment is a “key focus area for the FTA.”
“I can assure you that is also the case for the MBTA, this requested delay signifies the MBTA’s commitment to getting the final outcome of the project right,” Sandberg wrote. “Our press on hiring and resourcing our workforce in the short term will continue in parallel.”
Sandberg pointed to the thousand-plus hires and “significant progress” on the agency’s fiscal year 2023 hiring plan.
“We will apply even greater focus on our interim, FY24 hiring efforts while we work to push our planning to the required 5-year timeline,” Sandberg wrote. “We also continue to work on innovating in our hiring practices, with scheduled ‘Hiring on the Spot Events’ scheduled this fall, with expand (sic) scope on which roles are eligible for that event.”
Sandberg said the MBTA “is entirely open to further conversation” about the requested extensions and the agency’s thinking “if the FTA flags any concerns.”
The request from the MBTA comes the same week officials acknowledged that trains on the $2.3 billion Green Line Extension had slowed to a walking pace, or 3 mph, in some places because of defective track.
The agency’s chief of infrastructure said Thursday that the extension “didn’t meet construction standard” and Eng told reporters he is looking into how the situation occurred.