The Regional Transportation District’s elected board director representing central and east Denver resigned this week due to a serious illness, leaving Mayor Mike Johnston to pick her replacement for this year.
Kate Williams, who represented District A, made the decision to step down after a terminal cancer diagnosis that gives her limited time left to live, she told The Denver Post on Friday.
“I’ve been doing it seven years, and I would do it for another seven if I had the opportunity,” she said. “I’m very, very fortunate. Not a lot of people get the time to say goodbye.”
Board chair Erik Davidson announced Williams’ resignation during a meeting Thursday. First elected in 2016 and reelected in 2020, Williams was term-limited from running again. Her term was scheduled to end in December.
Since the district is mostly in Denver, state law gives the mayor the power to fill the vacancy, with City Council approval. Whomever Johnston appoints to fill the rest of her term will have to run for election in November to continue serving.
“Kate is in me and my family’s prayers,” Johnston said. “With her decision to step down, I will work closely with partners across the city to appoint another forward-thinking, transit-minded member to the RTD board.”
Chris Nicholson and Jacob Turner already are running to represent District A in the election. District A encompasses part of downtown Denver as well as Cherry Creek, Glendale and Lowry.
Turner said Friday that he would be willing to discuss the pending appointment with Johnston, “but my focus is on running my campaign for the November election.”
Nicholson said he would seek the mayor’s appointment.
“Director Williams has done our community a great service with her work on the board,” he wrote in a statement, citing RTD initiatives she’s worked on. “Free access for youth, reduced fares and improved paratransit alone are an important legacy.”
Nicholson, a political consultant and technologist who moved to Colorado seven years ago, calls himself “a full-time transit rider.” He said he has raised more than $15,000 in his first quarter as a candidate since announcing his run for office in October.
“District A has some of the highest transit ridership in the metro area,” Nicholson said. “Whether it’s me or someone else, we deserve a representative who understands what it’s like to rely on RTD.”
Turner, a graduate student and web designer, also uses RTD as his primary mode of transportation.
“I simply have a passion for youth involvement as someone who was involved in politics as a youth,” he said in an interview Friday. “I want to increase those opportunities and expand on plans such as the Zero Fare for Youth pilot program.”
About Williams, he said: “My thoughts and prayers are with her.”
A longtime transit advocate outside of her RTD board service, Williams said she hoped Denverites would embrace the transit system more fully, “so that we can get out of our cars and keep our grandchildren alive and spare our air,” she said.
“Unless people start riding it, you know, we’re shooting ourselves in the foot,” Williams said. “We’re just Coloradans, and we like our guns and our cars.”
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