I was assigned as Superintendent of the Fort Worth Service Unit on June 16,1998, shortly after Joe Whalen was transferred to North Little Rock as Superintendent. Previous to this job I was the Director of Quality and Transportation on this service unit. I moved to Fort Worth from Chicago October 1996.
I am very happy to be part of the Fort Worth Service Unit. I am looking forward to meeting all of you as soon I fill the DQT position, which should be no later than July 1. That job will be filled by Andy Yedlick from Little Rock. Andy has been the Director of Terminal Operations at Pine Bluff for the last few years.
This service unit has a good safety record and my intentions are to work closely with various groups and departments to make our work place injury free. To do this, we need communications and cooperation from everyone. It will take positive work habits, attention to detail, watching out for your fellow employees, strict compliance to rules (especially Cardinal Safety Rules), and most of all, understanding that each of us is responsible for safety.
I will be asking for your help to clear the congestion and increase the flow of traffic at Centennial and our other yards so we can meet our customer requirements. The velocity of our car movement and train speed is not where it should be and this causes the depletion of our resources of crews and power.
On the personal side, I have been married to joyce for 27 years, I am 47 years old. We have two children, Michelle, 26 and Nick, 22. Both of them are pretty much on their own.
Again, I'm looking forward to working together with each of you. Let's finish 1998 injury free.