BART Board elects two women to lead agency
President Lynette Sweet pledges to increase diversity
Today the BART Board of Directors unanimously elected two women to BART's most powerful posts?Board President and Vice President.
President Lynette Sweet and Vice President Gail Murray assumed their respective posts after the nine member Board of Directors cast their votes during today's Board meeting at BART Headquarters in Oakland. The BART Board is made up of three Directors from each of the BART District's three counties; San Francisco, Alameda and Contra Costa. Every year the Board Members elect their Board President and Vice President.
Historically, the Board Members who assume the President and Vice President posts will be from a different county than the Board Member who previously held each post.
PLEDGE TO INCREASE DIVERSITY AT BART
After her election, President Sweet delivered a speech in which she first thanked outgoing President Carole Ward Allen, Ed.D. for making "BART a much stronger and more dynamic organization for our employees and our customers."
President Sweet then said she would use her presidency in part to lead BART into an era of even better representation for women and minorities in the agency's upper managerial ranks. She said that while she's proud of the fact that overall, BART's 3,100 employees represent the diversity of the Bay Area, her goal is to increase minority and female representation in the upper managerial ranks.
"We need to do a better job reflecting the Bay Area's diversity in the places where decisions are made and influence is brought to bear,"
ABOUT PRESIDENT SWEET
Voters elected Lynette Sweet to her first full term in November 2004 after the Board appointed her on February 20, 2003 to replace former BART Director Willie B. Kennedy who retired from the Board mid-term. Coincidentally, Kennedy came to today's Board meeting to congratulate President Sweet.
President Sweet represents District seven, which is the only BART District to bridge the Bay. It includes Albany, Emeryville, El Cerrito, Richmond, San Pablo and portions of Berkeley, Oakland, El Sobrante and San Francisco.
President Sweet currently serves as a Board Member and the Executive Director of the African American Interest Free Loan Association. She was formerly a Vice President with Union Bank of California and the former Executive Director of Bayview Hunters Point Center for Arts and Technology (BAYCAT) She graduated from the University of California at Berkeley. She lives in San Francisco. Her biography is available online here.
ABOUT VICE PRESIDENT MURRAY
Voters elected Gail Murray to the BART Board of Directors on November 2, 2004 to represent District 1, which includes Walnut Creek, Concord, Clayton, Pleasant Hill, Orinda, Moraga, Lafayette, and half of Danville.
Vice President Murray brings to the BART Board a wealth of transportation experience. She is the President of Gail Murray Consulting, specializing in public transit policy and planning. She is also a Research Associate with the Mineta Transportation Institute at San Jose State University.
Vice President Murray has been Mayor, Council Member, Planning Commissioner, and Transportation Commissioner for the City of Walnut Creek, and Chair of the Central Contra Costa Transit Authority. At today's Board meeting, Vice President Murray said, "My goals are to support the Board and the organization and especially the riders and taxpayers of the BART District." Her biography is available online here.