Major departures at NTTA without announcement (PERSONNEL)

Two major personalities have recently departed North Texas Tollway Authority without there being any announcement. The quiet departees are:

- Rick Herrington, former #2 and deputy executive director

- Susan Buse, former chief financial officer

Both were longtime senior figures at NTTA, and Susan Buse was very active at IBTTA. She was president of the toll industry association a couple of years back.

Janice Davis is the new chief financial officer at NTTA.  Davis had the CFO position for four years at the City of Atlanta, and before that at the City of Philadelphia.

We haven't been able to establish Buse's present whereabouts to ask her, but have been told she is doing "some independent consulting work."

Herrington only departed the number two position at NTTA a "couple of weeks ago," an official there told us. She said he left to take a position at HNTB where he is "national toll sector leader" working out of the Dallas office.

He has not been replaced at NTTA, and his appointment at HNTB has not been announced. (ADDITION) Yet. We're now told it soon will be.

One person who did not wish to be quoted told us the departures were the product of disharmony at NTTA, but Rick Herrington says that's not the case. He says he has great respect and affection for NTTA executive director Allen Clemson - a veteran of Dallas County government where he was administrator 1985 to 2009 - who came to NTTA in June. 

Herrrington says he was asked to stay and that he only left because HNTB made him a better offer, and his departure was quiet because he asked NTTA "not to make a fuss about it."

Herrington's title at HNTB is VP Toll Services Director Western US.

TOLLROADSnews 2009-10-19 (ADDITIONS 2009-10-20 11:20)