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The au­thor­ity that over­sees two of the Wash­ington area's main airports and a mul­ti­billion-dollar project to ex­tend Metrorail to Dulles International has become bitterly di­vided over who its next chief exec­utive ought to be.

At stake are the op­erations of Dulles and Reagan National airports, the Dulles Toll Road and man­age­ment of the massive rail project, which already has been crit­icized for spiraling cost es­ti­mates.

The leading can­didate has had an im­pressive rise in the transit indus­try. Howev­er, crit­ics question his ability to man­age mon­ey because of person­al financial prob­lems, while at least one support­er al­leges that racism against the African American man motivates some of the oppo­sition.

Nathaniel P. Ford Sr. started out as a train con­ductor in New York City. He became a top transit exec­utive in Atlanta and San Francisco, where he is chief of the Munic­ipal Trans­portation Agency .

By all accounts, he's a charm­ing, charismat­ic fig­ure.

But for the Metropoli­tan Wash­ington Airports Au­thor­ity, he's also become a divisive one, expos­ing rifts on the board over what type of lead­er should hold a role so crit­ical to the region's econ­o­my.

Questions were raised about Ford's financial judg­ment af­ter board members learned that he owes back taxes, accord­ing to sources close to the search who would talk only on the con­dition of anonymity. Oth­er concerns have centered on his use of corporate cred­it cards and a lavish party he threw for the transit au­thor­ity in Atlanta.

Sources said board members are also dissas­tisfied that they did not learn of these issues until af­ter Ford's initial inter­view. Some blame Ford for not vol­unteering the information; oth­ers blame the board's search firm for not flagging it sooner. The search firm, Mary­land-based Krau­thamer & As­sociates, did not return messages seeking com­ment Friday.

Ford's can­didacy has been fur­ther muddied by the narrow split among board members. In an informal poll, sev­en voted for him and six against. One vote in fa­vor came from a member who has at­tended only one meeting in two years; his most re­cent absence was because he is stuck in a ho­tel in Ivory Coast because of post-election po­lit­ical unrest.

In response to concerns about Ford's can­didacy and the se­lection process, Rep. Frank R. Wolf (R-Va.) last week asked the Govern­ment Account­ability Office to review the op­erations of the au­thor­ity and its over­sight of the rail project that Wolf helped revive in 2008, af­ter it appeared that fed­eral as­sistance would not come through.

The au­thor­ity has had to answer questions from fed­eral transit of­ficials about the cost and man­age­ment of the 23-mile Metrorail exten­sion, now projected to cost as much as $6.6 billion. Wolf said that whoev­er runs the au­thor­ity "ought to be a per­son with hon­esty and integrity, who has the capa­bility to build the rail on time and on bud­get - and to op­erate two airports that are the lifeblood of this region."

In an inter­view with The Wash­ington Post, Ford said he should be judged on his overall pro­fes­sion­al track record.

"All of my projects come in on sched­ule, with­in their bud­get," he said, point­ing to a project to ex­tend light rail in San Francisco. "On a pro­fes­sion­al lev­el, there's nev­er been a question of my financial ac­umen or ability."

The airports au­thor­ity is an enor­mous op­eration, a self-support­ing entity with 1,400 employees and a $1.9 billion bud­get. The search for a new lead­er began last spring af­ter chief exec­utive James E. Bennett an­nounced that he would re­tire af­ter 14 years. He has been replaced temporarily by E. Lynn Hampton, the chief financial offi­cer since 1989, who in­tends to re­tire af­ter a new exec­utive is named.

The 13-member board is a regional affair, with ap­point­ments from the pres­ident and the govern­ments of Vir­ginia, Mary­land and the Dis­trict. Board chairman Charles D. Snelling, a fed­eral ap­pointee from Pennsylvania, and his col­leagues con­tacted by The Post said the se­lection process was in­tended to be a confidential person­nel mat­ter.

Accord­ing to sources close to the search, the board's pre­lim­inary vote al­lowed it to move ahead informally last week, offering Ford a salary of $375,000 - a fig­ure that would make Ford one of the high­est-paid airport exec­utives in the nation. Bennett, who re­tired last spring, was paid $332,750, and some on the board consid­er Ford's offer too high, while oth­ers view it as nec­essary to attract top-flight ta­l­ent.

The board's monthly meeting is sched­uled for Wednesday, and support­ers are press­ing to take a formal vote then.

Those who support Ford, 49, are attracted to his person­al story and resume. He earned a bach­e­lor's degree from Mer­cer Uni­versity in 2005, af­ter as­cending to the top job in Atlanta's transit agency. Support­ers point to his deep expe­ri­ence man­aging di­verse transit systems with buses, rail, complex finances and construction projects. Rail expe­ri­ence, they say, will be crit­ical in man­aging the high-stakes Metro project. His qualifications, they say, out­weigh concerns about person­al financial trou­bles that he is working to address.

Those who oppose Ford question his financial judg­ment and char­ac­ter, saying he was not im­me­diately upfront about taxes owed to the Internal Rev­enue Ser­vice. Ford inter­viewed for Metro's top job last year but was not se­lected as one of the three finalists. D.C. govern­ment of­ficials thought he was a strong can­didate to lead the city's trans­portation de­part­ment but decided that his ser­vices would be too expensive.

Ford made a fa­vor­able im­pres­sion on airports au­thor­ity board members dur­ing his first inter­view. But af­ter the inter­view, new information emerged from a more extensive background check. Records show at least $75,000 in liens filed against Ford by the IRS and the state of California last year for unpaid taxes.

Dur­ing his 2000-2005 tenure as general man­ag­er at the Metropoli­tan Atlanta Rapid Transit Au­thor­ity, Ford was also crit­icized by some state leg­is­lators and members of his board for us­ing a corporate cred­it card for person­al expens­es that he lat­er re­imbursed, including for cigar humidors at Chops restaurant. He also took flak for rou­tinely dining at high-end steak­houses and for host­ing an $84,000 hol­iday party for MARTA, accord­ing to reports in the Atlanta Busi­ness Chron­icle.

"If we'd had all this stuff before the first inter­view, I don't think he would have come back for a sec­ond inter­view. He snowed us," said a source close to the search.

When objections were raised about Ford, racial ten­sions emerged, accord­ing to sources, with one of three African American board members accus­ing the members opposed to Ford of be­ing racist. Oppo­nents said it was not a question of race, but one of char­ac­ter and com­pe­tence.

Bill Mose­ley, who served as chairman of the Atlanta agency board dur­ing Ford's tenure, called him a hands-on lead­er who helped pro­fes­sion­alize the agency. Ford dined at steak­houses like Morton's, Mose­ley said, because the "leaders and people he was trying to influ­ence were there. That's where he needed to be."

Mose­ley said that crit­icism of Ford was largely the result of newly elected Re­publican lawmakers looking for an easy po­lit­ical tar­get and that the hol­iday party was in­tended to boost morale among employees af­ter a pe­riod of layoffs.

Ford re­imbursed the agency for $10,804 in person­al charges dur­ing his five years, and lat­er paid an additional $1,000 for charges identi­fied as person­al by an internal au­dit. The transit au­thor­ity's review found "no il­le­gal or improp­er pay­ments" to Ford, accord­ing to doc­u­ments.

At San Francisco's Munic­ipal Trans­portation Agency, Ford is one of the city's high­est-paid public of­ficials, earning $309,000, accord­ing to his spokesman. His person­al financial trou­bles began, Ford said, when he agreed to defer annual raises and bonuses because of the city's bud­get woes.

With two chil­dren in col­lege, Ford said he cashed in some re­tire­ment funds to help cover tuition. The early-with­draw­al penal­ties "cre­ated a larg­er tax burden for my fam­ily than we expected," he said. For a time, Ford said he also had trou­ble rent­ing out the home he still owns in Georgia.

"This current eco­nom­ic cli­mate has had neg­ative impacts on ev­eryone," Ford said.

The state of California lien of $11,939 has been re­solved, Ford said, and "we've been working for over a year and a half to try to work out a satisfactory arrange­ment with the IRS."

Ford would be paid $70,000 in de­ferred compen­sa­tion from his con­tract at the time of his de­par­ture, accord­ing to his spokesman.

Ford's financial prob­lems were no secret to Tom Nolan, the chairman of the board that over­sees the San Francisco agency, but he consid­ered them person­al. Nolan and San Francisco Super­vi­sor Sean Elsbernd praised Ford for nav­igating the city's politics, bud­get trou­bles and for his stew­ard­ship of the final stages of a light-rail exten­sion and the early stages of a $1.6 billion Central Subway project that includes 1.3 miles of under­ground rail.

"He's been crit­icized for his high salary, but in my mind he's worth ev­ery penny of it," Nolan said. "If in fact he goes to Wash­ington, we're go­ing to have to get some­one almost just like him."

Tom Radulovich, who runs a trans­portation advocacy group and is a member of the board of the Bay Area Rapid Transit Dis­trict, said Ford may be ea­ger to move on. Because of a lack of po­lit­ical support, Ford was largely constrained from improving what Radulovich's group, Liveable City, consid­ers the poorly planned Central Subway project.

"If projects are off to a strong start, he'll hopefully keep them moving. But if there are flaws in the planning or execution, his tendency is to want to please his bosses and de­liv­er good news," Radulovich said.

Af­ter months of review­ing more than 100 applications, the airports au­thor­ity board narrowed the field of can­didates to 10, and then four finalists. When it came time for the board to take the informal vote that would al­low the pan­el to ex­tend a tentative offer, four members cast their ballots through a proxy. Only one, Mamadi Diane, had not partic­ipated in inter­view­ing can­didates, accord­ing to sources, al­though he received background ma­te­rials by e-mail.

Diane, who was first ap­pointed by for­mer D.C. mayor Antho­ny Williams, trav­els over­seas of­ten for his international trade busi­ness and has at­tended just one meeting since 2009, accord­ing to board records. For­mer mayor Adrian M. Fenty tried to replace Diane, whose term expired in Jan­uary 2009, and an­oth­er board member, for­mer D.C. Council member H.R. Crawford. But Fenty's efforts got caught up in po­lit­ical wran­gling with the council.

Mayor Vin­cent C. Gray, the for­mer council chairman, has nom­inated a replace­ment for Diane.

Diane said in an e-mail Sat­urday that he is confined to a ho­tel in Ivory Coast and is un­able to leave because of resistance to seating a new pres­ident whom Diane supports. It was un­certain whether Diane would be able to return home in time for a formal vote, which requires members to cast ballots in per­son.

Rep. Gerald E. Connolly (D-Va.), who has not been in­volved in the se­lection process but helped obtain fed­eral funding for the Dulles rail project, said he was most trou­bled by the pre­lim­inary vote.

"If there is a leading can­didate based on the support of an absentee member who at­tended just one meeting in years, boy, that would be of concern to me. I don't think that's a confidence-building measure."

Staff research­er Jennifer Jenk­ins con­tributed to this report.