State highway official resigns

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Barbecue baron Ollie Gates stepped down Friday from the state Highways and Transportation Commission.

Gates had worked closely over the past several years with Transportation Department director Henry Hungerbeeler, who on Tuesday announced his own resignation effective June 1."If Hungerbeeler feels strongly enough to resign his position, it's only fitting and proper that I do the same," Gates said.

Hungerbeeler's move followed an advisory panel's recent recommendations for major changes at the agency, which has struggled to repair Missouri's roads and its credibility.

The resignations of two top transportation officials could provide the "clear evidence that a new day has dawned at MoDOT" -- one of the top recommendations made a little over one month ago by the commission-appointed Blue Ribbon Panel on Accountability, Credibility and Efficiency.

Although Hungerbeeler's departure is effective June 1, Gates' resignation would be effective as soon as Gov. Bob Holden accepts it. Holden was in Washington, D.C., on political business Friday, said spokeswoman Mary Still.

Gates' six-year commission term was to expire anyway on March 1. Under a change made by the Legislature this year to stagger commissioners' terms, his successor -- or Gates himself, if he were reappointed -- would serve only until March 2005.

As such, Gates acknowledged that his resignation was largely symbolic. He claimed the report from the citizens advisory panel -- created under Gates' chairmanship -- "caused" Hungerbeeler to resign. Gates said it would be unfair for Hungerbeeler alone to leave, and he expressed hope that the public and Legislature would take note "of two of us having done it."

Without targeting specific positions, the citizens advisory panel recommended a culture change at the Missouri Department of Transportation by "reorganizing top management." To help restore credibility, the panel also recommended a public acknowledgment that the commission breached the public's trust in November 1998 by dropping 15-year-road plan adopted just six years earlier with a fuel tax increase.

Gates and current commission chairman Barry Orscheln are the only two remaining members of the 1998 panel, and Orscheln's term also is to expire March 1. Orscheln made the 1998 motion, noting then -- and still maintaining -- that there was no way to complete the plan because it was severely underfunded.

On Friday, Orscheln and other commissioners expressed shock at Gates' resignation. "Wow. Speechless!" Orscheln said after Gates' announcement.

Gates, who owns the Gates Bar-B-Q restaurants in Kansas City, joined the transportation commission in January 1998 and became chairman in November 2001. He led the commission until this September, when he voluntarily left the top spot a little early so that Orscheln could have a slightly longer turn as chairman.

A leading lawmaker and the chairman of the citizens advisory panel both expressed surprise about Gates' resignation.

"I can't believe that Ollie would be resign," said Jack Magruder, a former president of Truman State University who led the citizens panel. "I don't think there was anybody upset with Ollie."

House Transportation Committee Chairman Larry Crawford said he was sorry to hear about Gates' resignation. But he added: "This is another opportunity. I find that the new members on the commission have been more open at looking at change and being more responsive to everyone."

Friday's commission meeting was devoted partly to considering the recommendations of the advisory panel. Orscheln said he was frustrated by the perception that the commission in 1998 had simply tossed the 15-year road plan aside.

"First of all, I think it's inappropriate for this commission to apologize for what prior commissions did," Orscheln said, adding later that "despite the word 'abandon' being used daily since that time, 97 percent of all the projects that the commission has built and will build through 2008 are 1992 projects."

Other commission members said the focus of the transportation department must be on the Missouri's current and future transportation needs, but that officials must not repeat the mistake of promising more than is financially certain.

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Associated Press newswoman Dana Fields in Kansas City contributed to this report.

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Transportation Department: http://www.modot.state.mo.us