Former National Association for Pupil Transportation (NAPT) board member Peter Mannella has retired from the New York Association for Pupil Transportation (NYAPT), where he served as executive director.
NYAPT named David Christopher, formerly a training specialist for the Pupil Transportation Safety Institute, to succeed Mannella as executive director. Christopher and Mannella will work together over the coming months to run NYAPT with its current president, Michael Sweeney of Westmoreland Central School District, and incoming president, Harold Nicholson of Corinth Central School District.
Mannella was educated in New York, having received a bachelor’s degree in political science from SUNY at Oswego. He served as executive director of NYAPT for over 14 years, while also concurrently working during the same time period as executive director of the Cyr Foundation for Excellence in School Transportation. Prior to that, he was vice president of Carr Public Affairs in Albany for almost 10 years, and before that, director of job training for New York State Economic Development.
Mannella currently chairs the NAPT resolutions committee.
Sept. 28 was his last official full-time day at NYAPT’s office in Albany, “after 23 years with these wonderful people,” said Mannella. However, he told School Transportation News that he will continue with the association as an independent consultant and lobbyist. In the meantime, Mannella celebrated his retirement with friends and associates during an event over the weekend at the Albany Marriott Hotel.
NYAPT is a 550-member professional association that was founded in 1974. It supports, develops and represents those who are “responsible for the safe and efficient transportation of 2.3 million children to and from school each day.”
