Amtrak public Board Meeting (12/1/22)

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Wondering if it will be posted on YouTube afterwards. I just signed up (today's the last day to do so), but, barring a pre-strike curtailment of service or severe weather, I'll be driving to Kissimmee or moving about the station in preparation to board the SM during most of it.
 
Funny that I mentioned this today - I just received my invite from Amtrak for the meeting.
Yep. I must have received it sometime yesterday. Anyway, I registered and got back the info on the webpage which I immediately entered into my Google Calendar using the link provided. Later noticed that I even got an email with the info.
 
Very interesting point from Gardner today I didn’t know in response to a question from Jim Mathews about the workforce. Gardner stated that no engineering and mechanical employees were furloughed and that the shortage there is completely due to not being able to keep up with attrition due to inability to hire during the pandemic downturn.
 
Gardner stated that no engineering and mechanical employees were furloughed and that the shortage there is completely due to not being able to keep up with attrition due to inability to hire during the pandemic downturn.
Other tidbits from Gardner:
- 90% of furloughed employees returned to work
- Fiscal Year 2022, attrition was 1,600 employees. Elsewhere they said they'd hired 3,700, so a net gain of 2,100.
- They plan to issue an LD fleet replacement RFI (Request For Information) in January '23, and an RFP (Request For Proposal) in summer '23.
 
At the beginning they said there were ~60 people attending in-person and 250 online. These are underwhelming numbers IMO. Seems there are a lot of people who like to grumble about Amtrak online but don't bother to actually engage with elected officials or Amtrak management when given the opportunity. Yeah, I know not everyone can get away from work to watch on a weekday, but with such small numbers I question whether Amtrak will bother with repeating this type of board meeting.
 
At the beginning they said there were ~60 people attending in-person and 250 online. These are underwhelming numbers IMO. Seems there are a lot of people who like to grumble about Amtrak online but don't bother to actually engage with elected officials or Amtrak management when given the opportunity. Yeah, I know not everyone can get away from work to watch on a weekday, but with such small numbers I question whether Amtrak will bother with repeating this type of board meeting.
They will have to - it’s required by law.
 
How many people were any of you expecting would attend a boring thing like a Board Meeting? More or less everyone that was paying attention at AU should have known about it. What proportion attended? AU should actually be a higher proportion than the general public situation.
 
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The deadline just to have the privilege of attending a virtual meeting was 7 days ago. I signed up while busy with other tasks like writing papers and trying to find a job paying a livable wage and didn't get an email confirmation, so I forgot about the meeting until earlier today when I checked AU and saw the thread was active again.

Maybe if the Board of Directors meetings were actually public every time they met, there would be higher attendance.
 
The deadline just to have the privilege of attending a virtual meeting was 7 days ago. I signed up while busy with other tasks like writing papers and trying to find a job paying a livable wage and didn't get an email confirmation, so I forgot about the meeting until earlier today when I checked AU and saw the thread was active again.

Maybe if the Board of Directors meetings were actually public every time they met, there would be higher attendance.
I would still like to know what attendance number would seem satisfactory. That would provide some indication of how realistic the expectations are. In my thinking 300 in a Board meeting is a pretty decent number. Would 600 be more acceptable? 6000?
 
I did not attend, actually just found out about it today too. Not like I would of been able to attend even if I was aware of it. So few days off. I did read the cliffs notes from those who did attend. Just like I hope someone reads the cliffs notes from any meeting that I have been able to attend in the past, or future.
 
Very interesting point from Gardner today I didn’t know in response to a question from Jim Mathews about the workforce. Gardner stated that no engineering and mechanical employees were furloughed and that the shortage there is completely due to not being able to keep up with attrition due to inability to hire during the pandemic downturn.

Wouldn't it have been great if Amtrak was forthcoming about this much earlier and mollify much of the criticism hurled at it? Transparency is your friend.
 
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