Sarah Feinberg, interim president of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's New York City Transit unit, is one of two nominations President Trump made Monday to the quasi-public Amtrak board of directors.
The other is Chris Koos, mayor of Normal, Illinois.
Feinberg had been an Amtrak board member when she was administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration. She was also U.S. Department of Transportation chief of staff.
She joined the MTA board a year ago, chairing its transit and bus committee. She became New York City Transit president in late January when Andy Byford resigned. Feinberg, who lives in New York, will keep her NYCT position, MTA communications director Tim Minton said.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo had offered the MTA chairmanship in 2019 to Feinberg, who declined citing family constraints. Cuomo then named Patrick Foye.
Earlier in her career, Feinberg was director of policy communications at Facebook and director of global communications and business strategy at Bloomberg LP. She is the founder of Feinberg Strategies LLC, a tech-focused business and communications consulting practice.
President Obama, a Democrat, nominated Feinberg as FRA administrator and the Republican-led U.S. Senate confirmed her. The FRA is the lone sole safety regulator of the U.S. rail system.
There, she developed and enforced rail safety regulations; managed a multi-billion dollar rail-investment portfolio; and led research and technology development programs. Feinberg was the second woman to lead the agency of nearly 1,000 employees in Washington, D.C., and eight regional offices nationwide.
In the Obama administration from 2009 to 2010, Feinberg was special assistant to the president and senior advisor to White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel.
Feinberg, a native of Charleston, West Virginia, received her bachelor's degree from Washington and Lee University.
Koos sits on on the advisory board of the advocacy group Transportation for America. Under his watch as mayor of Normal since 2003, development in its central business district has included a multimodal transportation center/City Hall, a Marriott hotel and conference center, a Hyatt Place Hotel, the Children’s Discovery Museum and other major multi-use construction.
Koos is a Bloomington-Normal native and attended Illinois State University.
