Sound Transit

When Joni Earl ’75 joined Sound Transit in 2000, she was unaware of the crisis facing the agency, which provides public transportation for Snohomish, King, and Pierce counties. As the new Chief Operating Officer, she was asked to review the struggling $1.9 billion project to build a light rail 21 miles along the Puget Sound corridor from SeaTac Airport to Seattle’s University District. She discovered that it was several years behind schedule and would cost at least $1 billion more to complete. Three months after she took the job, her supervisor resigned. Earl became the acting executive director and later that year was hired as … » More …