Embattled Capital Metro President and CEO Fred Gilliam announced his retirement this afternoon, effective Oct. 16. His stormy tenure was marked by a commuter rail system that still has not debuted two years after it was originally scheduled to start, a labor strike, and a financial crisis, but Gilliam said the decision was financial, not political.

“Today is the last day that I can accept” an early retirement package offered by the Cap Metro Board of Directors earlier this year, said Gilliam, 67. “If I miss the window of opportunity I will not be able to take advantage of the early retirement. … If I miss it, it’s just like throwing money away.”

Asked if local elected officials had pressured him to call it quits – specifically state Sen. Kirk Watson is rumored to have told Gilliam to leave or be forced out – Gilliam said “I cannot confirm that.” Watson would not confirm it either.

Gilliam added that he would not have retired if the package hadn’t been dangled before him. “There’s never a good time [to retire],” said Gilliam. “This organization … always has projects going on. You just never come to a good point in life when you’re the leader of it that you’re going to have that opportunity where you don’t have anything to do.”

Stories had swirled around before Gilliam’s late afternoon press conference that some sort of law enforcement officials had been at Capital Metro headquarters removing boxes and/or computers. Gilliam said that was not true. “You have not described anything I’m aware of.”

Possible candidates to replace Gilliam include executive vice president and chief development officer Doug Allen and executive president of finance and administration Randy Hume.

Asked if he wanted the job, Allen said, “I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.”

Jay Wyatt, president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1091, which represents most of Cap Met’s drivers and mechanics, said Gilliam’s resigning was “long overdue.” Wyatt has called for Gilliam’s firing repeatedly.

“I think this place has been pushed down below the ground because of his mismanagement of this place,” Wyatt said. “I hope the board will be wise enough to go out and find somebody that knows what they’re doing. … [Not] how [former board chair] Lee Walker hired him. Do a national search to find the best qualified person.”

Asked who he’d like to see replace Gilliam, Wyatt said, “Randy Hume would be a good interim.” How about Allen? “Oh no,” Wyatt said. “Allen hasn’t been a general manager. Hume has.”