Allison Browns Rusnak is the Director of the Office of Legislative Affairs and Policy Communications at the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). In this role, she oversees FHWA's Congressional Affairs Team, Legislative Analysis Team, and Briefings Team. She leads a staff in developing and analyzing policy and legislative proposals, responding to requests from Members of Congress and congressional staff, preparing briefing materials for senior FHWA and Department of Transportation leadership, and communicating agency policies and priorities to internal and external stakeholders.
Previously, Allison served as the Team Leader for Strategic Coordination in FHWA's Office of Safety, directing the work of a multi-disciplinary team to carry out FHWA's strategic highway safety initiatives and leading the Office of Safety's policy and legislative development efforts. Prior to this assignment, Allison served for nearly a decade as a Senior Attorney Advisor with the FHWA Office of the Chief Counsel. In this role, she led FHWA’ s efforts in drafting legislation concerning priority surface transportation issues, including the programmatic and revenue portions of four major reauthorization legislative proposals.
Allison also served on detail at the White House from 2017-2018 as Senior Policy Advisor at the National Economic Council and Deputy Advisor for Infrastructure at the Council on Environmental Quality.
Prior to joining FHWA in 2008, Allison was an Attorney Advisor in the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's Office of the Chief Counsel. She began her career at the Department in 2002 as an Honors Attorney. Allison was the 2012 recipient of the Lawrence R. Schneider Award, awarded annually to an attorney with a distinguished record of ability and accomplishment.
Allison holds a Juris Doctor from The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law and a Bachelor's Degree in Economics and Political Science from Denison University.