Tri-Cities vice chancellor appointed as WSUV’s new budget chief

Damien Sinnott, WSU Tri-Cities vice chancellor of finance and administration, now holds a similar role at WSU Vancouver as interim vice chancellor of finance and operations. His appointment to the position was at the behest of Vancouver interim Chancellor Sandra Haynes, who is also chancellor of the Tri-Cities campus.

Sinnott plans to travel between the Vancouver campus and Tri-Cities every week, starting this week on the Vancouver campus. He also plans to stay active on Zoom and Microsoft Teams to communicate and keep up with both campuses.

Sinnott said he views Vancouver and Tri-Cities as sibling campuses, noting similarities in their relatively small sizes and reliance on enrollment revenue for their budgets. While he insisted that he wants to celebrate the differences between the campuses, Sinnott’s goal is to find better and more efficient ways of doing things.

“If we do things differently, I will want to know why,” he said. “If the Vancouver way is better, I want to bring it back. If the Tri-Cities campus is doing something better, I am going to bring that knowledge too.”

Sinnott will not be taking over enrollment management, which was previously under the jurisdiction of his predecessor Jennifer Chambers-Taube who left the position Aug. 29. He is unsure who will take on that area of responsibilities now.

“I think enrollment management being located in finance and operations is rare,” said Sinnott. “I have never really seen it. I think Jenny took that on and did a great job, but I don’t think it was ever intended to be a long-term solution.”

His first step for the Vancouver campus is to take a passive role as a listener, Sinnott said. He noted that he tries not to micromanage the teams on campus and focuses instead on enabling them to do their jobs by removing obstacles in their way, while relying on the teams to keep him informed about where they need help and support.

When asked about the changes in higher education policies and funding at the federal level, and if he or the WSU team intended to push back against them, he said:

“We are doing the best we can to comply with federal law,” said Sinnott. “Am I willing to sacrifice the ability to serve my students? I am not.”

Sinnott has been at WSU for just under 10 years, exclusively at the Tri-Cities campus. He has a background in government affairs, risk management, and business services, before going into into higher education. He was initially reluctant about taking the role at Vancouver, but he accepted Hayne’s request after speaking with Chambers-Taube, who was supportive of the decision.

Sinnott expects to be in the interim position for this academic year, but also said that “change is the only constant” and that if the plan were to change, it wouldn’t surprise him.