The praise for Brent Cagle at the Metropolitan Transit Commission's final meeting was unusually direct, and Chair Leigh Altman did not soften the before-picture to make the after-picture land.
"I think it's probably fair to say, if perhaps too colorful, that when Brent Cagle came into the leadership role, there was something of a hot dumpster fire," she said on May 27. Cagle, she noted, had not arrived with deep transit expertise. "And you righted the ship. You managed to bring professionalism and calm and transparency... Look at the history of CATS since you came on. It was a master's class."
The tribute carried a live question underneath it. The Charlotte Area Transit System still does not have a permanent chief executive — Cagle has been interim since December 2022 — and the search to fill the job permanently is underway right now, at the same moment the agency changes hands.
The turnaround, as the board described it
Cagle's own final report to the commission was a list of operational numbers, offered without much commentary. Bus on-time performance hit 85% in April, up from 82% a year earlier, and the agency had now hit its 85% goal for six straight months — what Cagle called the best on-time-performance streak since the spring of 2021. He credited the commission's own decision late last year to approve staff-recommended schedule changes.
He was candid about the soft spots. The Blue Line's on-time performance fell to 81.29% in April — unusually low for rail, which normally runs in the high 90s — because of 13 service days of single-tracking and a line-cut at several stations tied to construction for the future South End station. Blue Line ridership dropped 9.3% year-over-year, which Cagle attributed largely to those same construction delays. Local bus ridership slipped 2.2%; express routes rose 6%; the Gold Line was down 6.4% from a year earlier but up 7% from the previous month. Microtransit was the standout: 6,756 trips in April, up 156% year-over-year, finally matching or exceeding the ridership of the Village Rider service it replaced.
Those are the agency's figures, presented by the agency. But the board's assessment of the man who delivered them was independent, and it was unanimous in tone. Vice Chair Rusty Knox, the mayor of Davidson, put it plainly: "Brent, you're a rock star. You know that. I mean, if anybody doubts your leadership abilities, they can come see me." Tony Lathrop, chair of the N.C. Board of Transportation, thanked Cagle on behalf of NCDOT and noted he had "had sometimes a tough road to hoe."
What Cagle inherited
Cagle came to CATS in December 2022, by his own account, and attended his first MTC meeting in January 2023. He arrived in the middle of an institutional crisis — the kind that produces interim CEOs in the first place — and the "hot dumpster fire" framing was Altman's, not a neutral characterization, though no one in the room disputed it.
What he leaves the new authority is a system with a six-month on-time streak, growing microtransit demand, and a monthly public reporting habit that several members singled out for praise. "I think it's wonderful to have that level of report out to the community on a monthly basis," Altman said, "so they can know what's working and what isn't."
The job that isn't filled
The reason the tributes matter beyond sentiment: the permanent CEO search is real, active, and competitive — and Cagle is in it.
The Metropolitan Public Transportation Authority, the body taking over CATS on July 1, retained the executive search firm Krauthamer & Associates in mid-May to conduct a national search for a permanent chief executive. The board has said Cagle is eligible to apply and will be treated as a full candidate. He has continued running day-to-day operations throughout.
Cagle, for his part, kept his own remarks to the commission brief and pointed them backward, not forward. "I came to CATS, as most of you all know, in December of 2022," he said. "I've also now come to really respect and appreciate all of the support that the MTC has given to CATS over my time... but also over the 25-plus years of the existence of the MTC. On behalf of the entire CATS family, thank you."
He did not mention the search. He did not need to. The board that spent its last meeting telling him he had run a master's class will not be the body that decides whether he gets to keep doing it. That decision belongs to the authority he was thanking the old commission for building.