Session 4

Christina is a results-driven equity, diversity, access, and inclusion professional with twenty years of experience working with underrepresented populations. Ten years of her experience is grounded in organizational inclusion policy and process change. As the City of Fort Worth's first Chief Equity Officer and Director of Diversity and Inclusion, she is responsible for overseeing the implementation of 22 recommendations made by the Race and Culture Task Force across criminal justice, economic development, education, governance, health, housing, and transportation. She also oversees the Fort Worth Human Relations Commission which is responsible for ensuring legally mandated non discrimination in housing, employment, and public accommodations. Before joining the City of Fort Worth as the City's first Chief Equity Officer, she served in the City of South Bend's Mayor’s Office as the first Diversity and Inclusion Officer for the City under Mayor Pete Buttigieg. In South Bend, Christina led workforce, workplace, community, diversity purchasing and contracting, and small local MWBE policy development. She also led the South Bend Human Rights Commission Staff from the Mayor’s Office which had jurisdiction to all of St. Joseph County. She served as the City LGBTQ liaison, and also led the City of South Bend's first MWBE Disparity Study. Additionally she wrote and led the City’s Inclusive Procurement Grant with Living Cities and Citi Foundation. Prior to those positions, she also held positions at the University of Notre Dame Gigot Center for Entrepreneurial Studies (now IDEA Center), Undergraduate Admissions Diversity Recruitment Leadership Team, TRIO Programs, and Human Resources as Notre Dame’s first Program Manager for university-wide Staff Diversity Recruiting. Christina holds a bachelor’s degree from Indiana University at South Bend with concentrations in Political Science and History and a Master’s in Non Profit Administration from the University of Notre Dame Mendoza College of Business. Christina also holds a Master Compliance Administrator certification from the American Contract Compliance Association through Morgan State University. She also holds Municipal Emergency Management Institute certifications from FEMA.

Shuchisnigdha Deb is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering at the University of Texas at Arlington. She earned her PhD from Mississippi State University, Masters from Montana State University, and Bachelors from Shahjalal University of Science and Technology (Bangladesh), all in Industrial Engineering.

Her research interest includes human factors engineering and ergonomics, human computer/robot interaction, human-centered design, virtual reality in autonomous vehicle research and engineering education, training, and assessment. Her research has been published in journals including IEEE Transactions on Human-Machine Systems; Transportation Research Part F: Traffic Psychology and Behaviour; Transportation Research Part C: Emerging Technologies; Applied Ergonomics; and Accident Analysis and Prevention.

Chad Edwards, a public transit professional with more than 20 years of experience, has joined Trinity Metro as Vice President of Planning & Development in June of 2021. Edwards will oversee planning, scheduling, government relations, facilities, grants and project management.

He previously served as the assistant director and regional mobility and innovation officer for the City of Fort Worth, where he managed the Transit Moves Fort Worth transit plan to create a 25-year projection for future transit investment. His other experience includes working as an assistant vice president for capital planning at DART and as program manager at the North Central Texas Council of Governments (NCTCOG),

Edwards earned a Bachelor of Arts in geography with a minor in environmental studies from Texas Tech University. He earned a Master of City and Regional Planning and a graduate certificate in geographic information systems from the University of Texas at Arlington. He serves as the co-chair of the Metropolitan & Municipality Planning Subcommittee for the American Public Transportation Association and as a member of the Surface Transportation Technical Committee for NCTCOG.

Ann has been with the City of Arlington since 2016 and currently serves as the Principal Planner for the Office of Strategic Initiatives. As Principal Planner, Ann performs comprehensive planning for the City and is heavily involved in transportation planning for the City, working to secure grant funding and pilot new technologies, including autonomous vehicles and demand response ride sharing.

Ann holds a BA in Anthropology and Environmental Science from Haverford College, a MS in Urban Planning from Columbia University, and a Ph.D. in Urban Planning and Public Policy from the University of Texas at Arlington. She has worked as a professional planner in New York, NY, Dallas, TX, and Arlington, TX. Ann is a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners.

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At the North Central Texas Council of Governments (NCTCOG), a regional planning organization centered around DFW, Brendon Wheeler works in Transportation Planning with the long-range plan team, focusing on long-range transit planning. After joining NCTCOG in December of 2018, he started out on the Roadway Corridor Studies team, running the regional travel demand model for various alternatives on large and small roadway projects. Brendon currently serves as the Deputy Project Manager for the Dallas-Fort Worth High-Speed Transportation Connections Study: a 3-year effort to plan for a state-of-the-art transportation facility between Dallas and Fort Worth to eventually connect with other high-speed transportation projects around the state.

Prior to his employment at NCTCOG, Brendon was a team leader at Wier & Associates, Inc., a civil engineering and land development firm in Arlington, for a 10 year period working on residential and commercial projects around the DFW region. It was at Wier that the engineering design experience provided the opportunity for Brendon to pursue a professional engineering license.

Having gained his civil engineering undergraduate degree from the University of Texas at Arlington in 2011, he always knew he wanted to be involved in regional transportation planning which is why he currently works at NCTCOG. The interplay between land use and transportation in creating a vibrant/healthy community and, eventually, a city is what brought him into this industry and what fuels the dream day after day.

Detra Whitmore, who joined Trinity Metro in 2005, serves as Vice President of Customer Experience. Her responsibilities include improving the customer’s experience through transit passengers’ insights and analytics, customer program and initiatives, and the Transit Envoy program. Whitmore provides strategic leadership to elevate Trinity Metro as a transit system innovator in the area of customer experience. Her focus is on reinforcing a customer-centric culture and aligning operating realties of service throughout Trinity Metro service areas by building relationships with key external stakeholders and internal departments. In addition, Whitmore is the agency’s Freedom of Information and Records Retention Officer, and she is a certified Project Management Professional.

Mike was adopted and born in Waco. He went to Moody State School in Galveston, TX for a year where he learned to feed, walk and dress himself. Mike grew up in Jacksonville Texas, where he was a Boy Scout and in the FFA. He learned to ride horses. Mike graduated from Jacksonville High School, moved to Fort Worth in 1980. Mr. Wyss worked at America Red Cross Fort Worth TX for 14 years and has been on the Mayor's Committed On Persons With Disabilities (MCPD) for 22 years. Mike served as the MCPD Chair Lead of the Accessibility Sub-Committee for several years and has also been a Human Relations Commissioner for 2 years. He interacts closely with the CFW ADA Coordinator, Al Henderson, on citizen's concerns and regarding accommodation and accessible issues throughout the city of Fort Worth. For example, Mike brought the attention of TexRail executives that the TexRail train cars needed signage on the outside of each car, i.e. the location of the restroom, bike car, and quiet car. In addition to addressing transportation issues with the conventional train and bus modes of transportation systems throughout Fort Worth, his transportation passion has extended to bikes and pedestrians. Mike Wyss became involved with and a regularly attendee of the Bike and Pedestrian Commission Meetings.