Sarah Feinberg is the current Interim President of the New York State Transit Authority and the former Administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration. Feinberg was born on October 3, 1977, in Charles, West Virginia, to her parents Lee Franklin Berg and Mary Elizabeth Stanley. Feinberg's father is a West Virginia state legislator, while her mother was a U.S. district court judge in West Virginia until she retired in 2013. Feinberg became active in politics from an early age, where she campaigned for her father, who was running for a Congress seat in West Virginia. Sarah grew up in Charleston, where she attended Charleston Catholic School for middle and high school. She was athletic and participated in the cross-country championships. Feinberg completed high school in 1995, and upon graduating, she enrolled at Washington and Lee University and graduated in 1999 with a degree in Politics.
Immediately after graduation, she landed a job at Capitol Hill, where she worked as a staff assistant for the senate committee in charge of veterans' affairs. She later found a job at a marketing company in Charleston, an environmental working group, but she later returned to politics. During the 2000 presidential election between George Bush and Al-Gore, Sarah served as a communications director of West Virginia for the Al-Gore campaign. It was during this period that she met her husband-to-be, Daniel Pfeiffer. Sarah furthered her position as a communications director, and by 2002, she was working for the state democratic party as a communications director for Senator Tim Johnson's campaign in South Dakota (Steve, 2015).
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Feinberg worked as a deputy director of the Senate Democratic communications in 2003. Later that year, she became the press secretary for Senate majority leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota. Feinberg became the press secretary for the Democratic congressional campaign committee in 2005. She then became the communications director for the House Democratic caucus, where she had close ties with Rahm Emmanuel, the Democratic caucus Chairman. Emmanuel became Obama's chief of staff when Obama assumed office in 2008. Feinberg worked as a member of Obama's transition team. She later got a position at the White House as the senior advisor for the White House Chief of Staff and a special assistant to the President. Feinberg left government service in 2010 when she got a job as a director of Bloomberg LP communications; she served in this position from 2010 to 2011. In 2011, she got a position at Facebook as a Director of Policy and Crisis Communications; Feinberg worked at Facebook from 2011 to 2013.
Feinberg sought a job back at the Obama administration in 2013, and she got one as Chief of Staff to Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx. She stayed at this position until 2015 when she was nominated by President Barrack Obama for the role of administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration and was confirmed by the Senate (Feinberg, 2015). Feinberg faced a lot of criticism, most critics arguing that she had no experience in railroad systems. She was the second woman ever to serve in that position. She served in this position until 2020 when she was appointed as the interim President of the New York transit authority by Governor Andrew Cuomo. After the resignation of Andy Byford from the position, the MTA named Feinberg for this position.
Andrew Cuomo appointed her to the position after Byford resigned after clashing with governor Cuomo. Feinberg was able to get this position due to her impressive record performance while working as an administrator for the railway system. Her close relationship with Cuomo was also a contributing factor to landing the job. Feinberg took office on March 2 before Andrew Cuomo instated a state of emergency in New York due to the novel Coronavirus pandemic. As the interim President, Feinberg will be in charge of overlooking 48000 state employees of the New York City transport system and operations of the Subways, buses, and the Staten Island railway.
Cuomo's working relationship with Feinberg started in 2014 when she played an instrumental role in helping Cuomo avert a crisis with the Long Island railroad workers. Cuomo then offered her a position in 2019 as a Chairman of the MTA then appointed her for the President interim role. The mayor of New York, Bill de Blasio, interfaced with Sarah Feinberg when she advocated the mayor to add more police to maintain law and order to the subways. Together with Pat Foe, chairman of the Metropolitan transport authority, Sarah wrote a detailed letter to the mayor urging 1000 more NYPD troops ( Irin, 2020).
In her tenure as the present Interim President of the New York transit system, she has successfully gained the trust of the members working for the state transit system. She has proven to be dedicated to representing the 51000 employees working tirelessly. She can be credited with also providing exemplary leadership at the critical time the novel coronavirus pandemic had halted most of the city transport systems from Subways to transit buses to limit operations. Feinberg has also faced many challenges; the crime rate in the subway system has increased with more hate crimes and assault cases happening at the subways. Feinberg has the responsibility to ensure that the state transit systems are safe for public use. She also clashed with mayor Di Blasio over reopening subways. De Blasio accused the MTA of not providing a clear, safe procedure for reopening transit systems after governor Cuomo announced public transport would be open to the public after mass vaccinations began across the state.
In conclusion, Feinberg has played a big role for the Democratic Party, especially during her early years as a communication expert in charge of campaigns. She has shown remarkable leadership as the then administrator of the railway system and currently as the interim President of the New York transit authority.
References
Feinberg, S., & Feinberg, D. A. (2015). Association of American Railroads.
Steve, S (October 3, 2015). "Administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration: Who Is Sarah Feinberg?". AllGov.com http://www.allgov.com/news?news=857557
Irin, C (May 26, 2020). “The Woman Tasked with Saving the Subway Is Still Commuting on It Sarah Feinberg took over the city’s transit in a state of emergency – and controversy.”. Intelligencer. https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/05/sarah-feinberg-mta-profile.html
