Fascinating the spin the Uptown crowd immediately gave Keith Parker’s departure: See, we’re so great we keep losing talent! Ask yourself if any Fortune 500 company would make that claim.

Only city councilman Anthony Foxx seems to be speaking from the heart when he says Parker leaving after only 18 months on the job is a shock and there is no obvious second-in-command to take over. This is in stark contrast to the Post-Tober era when everybody and their brother knew Parker was waiting in the wings to run CATS.

You would hope that CATS could find someone from outside the organization to bring a fresh approach and no political baggage to what should be an apolitical job. But no. In fact, I sense that both city and county leaders are looking to de-emphasize CATS as an independent entity and assume a greater role in transit planning — and politics — for themselves.