As Executive Vice President, Chief Experience and Engagement Officer for CapMetro, Samantha leads the agency’s strategic initiatives and team members in Customer Service, Community Engagement, Communications, Marketing and Client/Business Development. These teams are unified in their effort to provide valuable experiences and meaningful engagements with our community, customers, partners and team members.

Samantha joined CapMetro in 2019 as its Director of Brand Communications and served as the Senior Director of Public Affairs and Engagement, leading the agency’s Community...

Raised in Austin, Heather is an active member of the business, arts, and volunteer community. Her career spans finance, civil and environmental engineering, health science, and education. She maintains a strong enthusiasm and curiosity about the world and our ability to foster positive change over time. Her current focus includes Placemaking, Mobility Hubs, and Pilot Programs for Austin Transportation & Public Works.

Heather is a longtime Texas musician and writer who has performed and recorded with local, regional, national and international acts often pseudonymously. She has...

Brian Butterfield is a Senior Vice President focusing on Office Tenant Representation at Cushman & Wakefield | Oxford Commercial. A native of the Lone Star state, and an Austin resident for more than 15 years, Brian is both personally and professionally invested in the long-term economic health and vibrancy of Austin. To each of his clients he brings a keen understanding of the culture of city, the professionals that give it meaning to him, and the nuances of the submarkets and product types.

Brian is keenly aware of the transportation that Austin struggles with every day...

Blanca serves as the Director of Parking and Transportation Services at The University of Texas at Austin. She graduated with a degree from UT in Advertising, has received her Masters in Public Administration and Urban and Environmental Planning, and completed her doctorate in Adult, Professional, and Community Education. In her position, she oversees all day-to-day operations of alternative transportation on campus including: shuttles, carpools, vanpools, carshare, and Bike UT. Blanca is currently working on implementing other sustainable programs on campus that would benefit the UT...

Sarah Garza is the Director of Mobility Industry Partnerships for Workforce Solutions Capital Area (WFSCA), a private, publicly funded 501(c)(3) nonprofit responsible for the data-driven planning, oversight, and evaluation of workforce development activities in Austin-Travis County. In this role, Sarah is responsible for leading the industry sector partnership, which is a shared table of employers, educational providers, community-based organizations and project owners in the mobility and infrastructure industry.

Sarah is an alumnus of Occidental College, where she holds a BA in...

As VP of Public Affairs, Matt leads the Downtown Austin Alliance's advocacy and influence initiatives and serves as a key connector between policy leaders and the Downtown Austin Alliance leadership. Additionally, he leads the Alliance's Mobility objectives, which seek to make Downtown easier and more enjoyable to access and move within; enhance pedestrian and transportation facilities; and improve connections to neighboring communities.

Since joining the Downtown Austin Alliance in Spring 2023, Matt successfully led the organization’s Project Connect Preferred Alignment strategy,...

Derek serves as the Program Manager of Partnerships and Business Development at CapMetro. In his role, he oversees the CapMetro for Business program, transit pass agreements with local government organizations and universities, and non-fare revenue programs like transit advertising.

Prior to joining the agency, Derek contributed to reshaping how individuals navigate from point A to B at car2go and Spin. At car2go, he played a role in the marketing of the free-floating carshare service and encouraged employers to add carshare as a...

Sandy Hentges Guzman is the Chief Executive Officer of the Austin Area Research Organization (AARO), a non-partisan nonprofit organization of 110 business and civic leaders from Travis, Williamson, Hays, Bastrop, Burnet and Caldwell counties that engages committed leaders in advancing regional solutions to benefit the long-term economic and social well-being of Central Texas.

Before her role at AARO, Sandy was the Legislative Director for Texas State Senator Kirk Watson. Initially focused solely on transportation policy for the senator, Sandy has also served as point on the senator’s...

Alex Houston has worked in TDM for several years, first at Movability as an intern, and currently with JLL, working for Meta. In her current role, she is Assistant Transportation Manager, and implements transportation programs in Central Texas and across the U.S. for one of the largest tech companies in the world.

Alex has direct experience with TDM programming and implementation strategies and has helped Meta adjust its transportation policies during and after the many changes that the COVID-19 pandemic brought to employers.

As an experienced CFO, Rey Madolora brings extensive experience in scaling and growing businesses, building passionate teams, fundraising (raising over $250M in capital), strategic planning, change management, and business transactions, with a focus on early-stage startup technology companies. He is a strategic thinker and has an innate ability to translate technical knowledge into practical financial guidance and creative business solutions. As a key business partner his strengths are engaging across the organization, understanding operations, and providing expert financial analysis to...

As director of Austin’s Transportation and Public Works Department (TPW), Richard Mendoza is responsible for providing safe, reliable and accessible mobility services for all Austinites – no matter how they choose to get around. Under Mendoza’s leadership, TPW builds and maintains our city’s roadways, bridges, sidewalks, and urban trails; designs and delivers our capital and neighborhood partnering improvement projects; and provides safe routes to school for our children.

Mendoza joined the City in January 2017 as the director of Public Works and served in that role until he was...

Jenell leads economic, demographic, geographic, and market research and analysis efforts to support the Downtown Alliance's strategic priorities.

She sets the annual research agenda and directs multiple research projects that support economic development, planning, and advocacy efforts. She serves as the staff lead for the Research Task Force and is the secondary staff lead for the Strategic Communication Committee. Prior to her work with the Downtown Alliance, Jenell worked for the City of Austin for more than 10 years.

Leigh joined Silicon Labs in 2016 and serves as Digital Marketing Manager. In this role, she manages digital programs including advertising, search engine optimization (SEO) and social media. She previously co-founded and ran Social Distillery, a local social media agency, for five years before finding the perfect B2B tech client to work for – Silicon Labs.

Leigh has a B.A. in Religion from Trinity University and an M.A. in Advertising from The University of Texas at Austin. She enjoys attending concerts, traveling, skiing, scuba diving, attending sporting events, hanging out with...

Aneka develops, supports, and grows the Global Commute program, "Whole Commute", Global Campus TDM strategy, and corporate security operations program across Whole Foods Market's growing, urban campus in Austin, TX. She previously served as Movability’s Mobility Challenge Program Manager, working in collaboration with the City of Austin’s Transportation Department, Central Texas companies and other stakeholders to successfully manage and execute the goals of the Mayor’s Mobility Challenge.

Prior to moving to Austin in 2018, Aneka served as the Transportation Outreach Specialist at...

Jim Pledger has lived in the Austin area for 30 years and is a partner at Jackson Walker LLP. He specializes in representation of financial institutions, including bank mergers and acquisitions, charters and charter conversions, public equity and debt offerings for financial institutions and the resolution of regulatory enforcement matters. Prior to joining Jackson Walker, he served as the Texas Savings and Loan Commissioner for 15 years.

Jim has served on the West Lake Hills City Council and its Zoning and Planning Commission and understands that traffic and transportation are among...

Bryan's accounting background has led him to a career in public service. He has worked for the City of Austin Treasury Department, and is currently the Chief Financial Officer for Austin Transit Partnership, the the independent local government corporation tasked with implementing Project Connect.

During his time working for the City of Austin he administered the financing portion of the various bond programs that support transportation throughout the City.

He is interested in the exploration of different funding initiatives to...

Danielle Skidmore is the President and Owner of Danielle Skidmore Consulting. She has 24 years of planning, design and construction experience on transportation projects throughout Texas. She has extensive experience with both roadway and drainage design for schematic and final design projects for counties, municipalities, and TxDOT.

A civil engineer with more than two decades of experience planning and designing public infrastructure, she has a deep appreciation for how our built environment impacts the way communities grow and how we move within them. As a downtown resident and a...

Rob leads STV’s new multidisciplinary smart cities practice, which includes a fully integrated suite of thinkers, planners, finance experts, designers, procurement and grant consultants, digital technologists and program managers, bolstering our advisory services offerings. Under Rob’s direction, the smart cities practice advises public and private clients on urban strategies, including long-range budget development and cost/revenue options, as they consider different approaches in mobility, social infrastructure, urban solutions, decarbonization and public resources...

With 30 years of experience in the transportation industry, Mia Zmud leverages the power of scientific research to guide emerging technology and innovation business strategies and market plans within the transportation industry. Holding C-level, senior advisor, and management roles spanning both the public and private sectors, Mia offers a unique perspective to guide strategic direction, partnership and alliance building, and market strategy. She is passionate about driving innovation solutions within the public sector to speed the adoption of emerging technologies, meet customer...