The man the Oregon Department of Transportation tapped nearly five years ago to deliver billions of dollars in freeway expansion projects in the Portland region is leaving the agency.
According to Willamette Week, ODOT Urban Mobility Office Director Brendan Finn has taken a job as chief of staff for Multnomah County Commissioner Vince Jones-Dixon.
Finn was the first ever director of the office and assumed the role just six months after it was launched. The Urban Mobility Office (UMO) was created in 2019 (initially called the Office of Urban Mobility & Mega Projects) with the goal of completed a suite of freeway expansion projects funded in the 2017 legislative transportation funding package known as HB 2017. That bill included earmarks for several megaprojects that ODOT claimed would reduce congestion in the region: the I-205 Tolling project, the Regional Mobility Pricing Project, the Boone Bridge Improvements project, the I-5 Rose Quarter Improvements project, and the I-205 Improvements. The projects became known as ODOT’s “Urban Mobility Strategy” and it was Finn’s job as UMO Director to get them done.
Finn earned a salary of $222,650 from ODOT in 2023 and oversaw a staff of 37 FTE with annual payroll of around $4.5 million. I’m not yet aware of why Finn left, but he appears to be taking a big paycut. A typical chief of staff at Multnomah County makes about $130,000 per year.
The last five years at the Urban Mobility Office have been a roller-coaster and Finn has been sitting on the front row.
When he took his position in 2020, the I-5 Rose Quarter project, which will widen I-5 through the Lloyd Center and adding highway covers with surface street improvements and real estate development on top, was in shambles. It lacked support from the City of Portland and ODOT was taking heat from activistsand elected officials. Even Metro called ODOT’s assessment of the project “inadequate” and “highly misleading.” In June 2023, Finn became emotional and walked out of an I-5 Rose Quarter advisory committee after members expressed disappointment about a lack of funding and progress. While there’s been some great news for the project earlier this year, it’s still dogged by lawsuits and lacks funding to be completed.
Finn’s mission received another big blow back in March when Governor Kotek paused work on the Regional Mobility Pricing Project. That plan that would have added tolls to freeways in the Urban Mobility Strategy that would pay for the projects and for continued operation of the Urban Mobility Office (UMO) itself. The lack of funding from ODOT and other sources to complete the projects has put the UMO in difficult straits.
Prior to leading the UMO, Finn was a transportation policy advisory for former Governor Kate Brown and previous to that he was a chief of staff for former Portland City Commissioner Dan Saltzman.
ODOT has yet to name a replacement for Finn. Stay tuned to see how his departure might impact the UMO and it’s projects going forward.
