Leadership
Board of Directors
N
ancy Zimpher
Chancellor, State University of New York
In June 2009, Nancy L. Zimpher became the 12th Chancellor of the State University of New York, the nation’s largest comprehensive system of higher education. Since that time, she has led the university in creating and launching a systemwide strategic plan, with the central goal of harnessing SUNY’s potential to drive economic revitalization throughout New York. Prior to coming to SUNY, Dr. Zimpher served as president of the University of Cincinnati, chancellor of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and executive dean of the Professional Colleges and dean of the College of Education at The Ohio State University.
Rita Athas
President, World Business Chicago
Athas has a long history with local government. She served in various positions with a number of suburban municipalities. Prior to joining Mayor Daley’s staff, she served as the Executive Director of the Northwest Municipal Conference, a consortium of 40 municipalities representing a population of over 1 million in Northwest Illinois which is widely recognized as one of the most innovative regional councils in the country. Athas was recognized by Crain’s Chicago Business, as one of the 100 most influential women in Illinois. She is a 1988-89 Leadership Greater Chicago Fellow. She has been appointed by the Illinois Governor to serve as a Great Lakes Commissioner. Athas serves as Vice President of the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning (CMAP). She is an Executive Council Member of Chicago Metropolis 2020. She is a member of the Chicago 2016 Olympic Committee and serves on the International Advisory Committee.
George Franco
Chairman & CEO, National Financial Corporation
Jorge “George” Franco is an accomplished and innovative chief executive with more than 30 years of successful investment and management experience in the small to midsized enterprise (“SME”) sector. Mr. Franco is chairman and chief executive of National Financial Corporation, a new generation financial services group of affiliated businesses that manage, administer, process, or help deploy millions of LMI consumer financial transactions nationwide. Mr. Franco is past chairman of the United States Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, where he helped realign the Chamber’s public policy agenda on Capitol Hill on behalf of more than 2.5 million Hispanic owned businesses in America. He served as the chief architect of a number of the USHCC’s national access to capital initiatives in partnership with various large financial institutions. His long history of community development work includes various national non-profit collaborations with McKinsey & Co. and complex business model development for the National Council of La Raza or “NCLR” LMI homeownership program funded by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development. He currently serves as chairman of a nationwide Economic Leadership Initiativefocused on performance based investment in SMEs with job creation as a favorable intended outcome.
Alina A. Gorokhovsky
Chief Strategy Officer, McKenna, Long & Aldridge
Alina has more than 20 years of experience in national and international business and public policy, working extensively with governments and the corporate sector in a wide-range of practice areas, including: public-private partnerships, energy, biodefense, risk management, government contracts, and government relations. She has helped clients strategize and implement public private partnership initiatives in transportation, health care, infrastructure, energy, IT, and government services. In addition to her experience in legal and policy sectors in the U.S. and Europe, she has worked throughout the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), living in Russia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, and Kazakhstan. Prior to joining the firm, she provided technical assistance to, and worked closely with, U.S., U.K., Canadian, and German Embassies, and business associations (throughout Europe and the CIS) on stimulating commercial sector development by encouraging the growth of a competitive private sector.
Paul Grogan
President and CEO, The Boston Foundation
Since July 2001, Paul S. Grogan has been the President and CEO of the Boston Foundation, one of the nation’s oldest and largest community foundations. The Foundation distributed over $82 million in grants to nonprofit organizations throughout the Greater Boston community in Fiscal Year 2010 and received gifts of almost $83 million. Mr. Grogan joined the Foundation from Harvard University, where he served as Vice President for Government, Community and Public Affairs from 1999 to 2001 and as a Senior Lecturer at the Harvard Business School. From 1986 through 1998 he was President and CEO of the nonprofit Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC), the nation’s largest community development intermediary. Mr. Grogan helped found and is the Board Chair of CEOs for Cities, a national network of urban leaders. Mr. Grogan is the author, with Tony Proscio, of Comeback Cities: A Blueprint for Urban Neighborhood Revival, published in October 2000 by Westview Press, which Ron Brownstein of the Atlantic Media Company has written is “arguably the most important book about cities in a generation.”
J
osh McManus
Chief Strategist, Create Here
Chief Innovator, Curator and Creative Director, Little Things LLC
Josh McManus is chief innovator, curator and creative director for Little Things, LLC a social innovation laboratory that explores pressing problems for cities. He is also co-founder of CreateHere, a place-based talent retention and cultural change project in Chattanooga, Tennessee that has sparked hundreds of creative enterprises, retained and attracted countless individuals to the city and championed the world’s largest community visioning process. Josh is a leader in demonstrating progressive strategies for retention and attraction of talent in post-industrial cities and is a constant advocate for using design theory to advance social innovation practice. In his spare time, Josh likes to build transformational cultural projects like Track29, a progressive performance venue for up to 2,000 people and bring it together, a project that can makeover a public school in a weeks time. Josh’s advancement of the talent retention field and place-based cultural work is informed by a career in innovation, nonprofit management, entrepreneurship, and development. Josh is a board member for CEOs for Cities, a Chicago-based think and act tank for those working to serve cities, a Marshall Memorial Fellow and Next American Vanguard.
Robert H. Milbourne
President and CEO, RHM Advisors
Robert Milbourne heads RHM Advisors, a business consulting firm, specializing in business strategy, financing, and corporate development for public and private companies. He is also a consultant to business for government affairs, governance and project development. Milbourne was the founding President & CEO of the Columbus Partnership, a civic organization of top business, education and community leaders formed in 2002 to improve the region’s economic future. He came to Columbus after serving as CEO of a similar group in Milwaukee for 17 years. Prior to his work in Milwaukee, he enjoyed a career in government and business. Milbourne worked in Wisconsin state government under Democratic and Republican governors. He served as State Budget Director and was honored as the “Outstanding State Official” in Wisconsin in 1979. Milbourne left government to become Vice President and Economist for the Kohler Company, a Fortune 500 manufacturer of plumbing products, engines and generators.
Marc Morial
President & CEO, National Urban League
In a distinguished professional career that has spanned 25 years, Marc Morial has performed all of these roles with excellence, and is one of the most accomplished servant-leaders in the nation. As a Professor, Morial served on the adjunct faculty of Xavier University in Louisiana, where he taught Constitutional Law, and Business Law. As a Louisiana State Senator, Morial was named Legislative Rookie of the Year, Education Senator of the Year, and Environmental Senator of the Year, while authoring laws on a wide range of important subjects. As Mayor of New Orleans, Morial was a popular chief executive with a broad multi-racial coalition who led New Orleans’ 1990’s renaissance, and left office with a 70% approval rating. As President of the National Urban League since 2003 he has been the primary catalyst for an era of change -- a transformation for the 100 year old civil rights organization. His energetic and skilled leadership has expanded the League’s work around an Empowerment agenda, which is redefining civil rights in the 21st century with a renewed emphasis on closing the economic gaps between Whites and Blacks as well as rich and poor Americans.
Brian Payne
President, Central Indiana Community Foundation
For the past ten years, Brian Payne has been the President of Central Indiana Community Foundation and The Indianapolis Foundation. During his tenure, he has redefined the business model and put a new emphasis on the Foundation’s ability to transform the City of Indianapolis through three specific community leadership initiatives: Family Success, College Readiness, and Inspiring Places. All three focus on positioning Indianapolis as a top ten city in developing, attracting and retaining human capital. The Indianapolis Cultural Trail, A Legacy of Gene & Marilyn Glick is the largest and most visible project of the Inspiring Places Initiative. In February 2010, the Indianapolis Cultural Trail, a one of a kind eight-mile urban bicycle and pedestrian trail, was one of 51 grant recipients from a pool of 1,400 proposals to receive a merit based TIGER grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation. This $20.5 million grant means the Cultural Trail is now fully funded and will be completed in 2012. In 2007, Brian was awarded the Michael A. Carroll Civic Leaders Award, Indianapolis’ most prestigious leadership honor for his efforts as founder and producer of the Cultural Trail. Prior to joining the Foundation, Brian ran professional theatre companies.
Cliff Thomas
Managing Director, Cisco
Cliff Thomas is a Managing Director in the Cisco Global Segment responsible for business development and route to market efforts for Cisco’s Smart+ Connected Communities (S+CC) focus on intelligent urbanization. His global team is responsible for developing business strategies creating new routes to market through joint ventures, new revenue share models, public private partnerships and business acceleration for Cisco’s clients, governments, and ecosystems partners. The approach leverages Cisco’s S+CC solutions, which include Education, Physical Safety & Security, Health & Wellness, Transportation, Residential, Retail, Hospitality, Sports & Entertainment, Utilities and Government. Cliff Thomas has 25+ years of experience in the telecommunications industry, including management consulting and a successful venture in a technology services start‐up. With 15 years at Cisco in various sales, business development and global leadership roles he has become an integral member of a team focused on entering and scaling new market opportunities. He is graduate from Loyola University in Baltimore, Maryland with a B.S. in Electrical Engineering and minor in Economics. Additional engineering thesis work on Pneumatic Wave Energy Conversion was completed at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland with a focus on sustainability.
Kim Walesh
Office of Economic Development Director and Chief Strategist, City of San Jose
Kim Walesh oversees strategic planning, partnerships, and innovations for the City of San Jose—the Capital of Silicon Valley and nation’s 10th largest city. Kim joined the City in 2003 to lead development of San Jose’s first comprehensive economic strategy, and oversees implementation. She leads strategic initiatives related to university collaboration, downtown regeneration, business engagement, cultural development, and City identity. Kim assists the City’s elected and executive leadership in understanding and addressing issues that affect the City’s long-term success. Prior to joining the City of San Jose, Kim was co-founder and managing director of Collaborative Economics, a Silicon Valley-based consultancy that works with business and civic leaders who want to build stronger economies and better communities. She is recognized for her expertise in economic competitiveness and civic leadership, and has advised leaders in places as diverse as Chicago, Columbus, Richmond, California’s Central Valley, China, Slovenia, and South Australia.
.jpg)
Anthony Williams
CEO, Federal City Council
Tony Williams, the former Mayor of Washington, D.C. (1999 – 2007), is the current Chief Executive Officer of the Federal City Council, an organization which serves as a catalyst for progress in the Nation’s Capital by focusing the creative and administrative talents of Washington’s business and professional leaders on major problems and opportunities that are facing the City. Prior to this he served as the Executive Director of the Global Government Practice at the Corporate Executive Board in Arlington, Virginia. He also serves as the William H. Bloomberg Lecturer in Public Management at the Harvard Kennedy School. In addition, he is a Senior Consultant to the firm McKenna Long and Aldridge, with particular emphasis on its municipal restructuring practice. During his two terms as Mayor, he is widely credited with leading the comeback of Washington D.C., restoring the finances of our nation’s capital, and improving the performance of government agencies, all while lowering taxes and investing in infrastructure and human services. Before his election as Mayor, he was the independent Chief Financial Officer of the District from 1995 to 1998, working with and on behalf of local officials, the D.C. Financial Control Board, and the U.S. Congress. Before his service in local Washington, Tony worked in a variety of positions in federal, state, and local government, including as the first CFO for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, appointed by President Bill Clinton and confirmed by the U.S. Senate. In addition to his work on company boards, Tony devotes his attention to issues of education and the environment, serving on the board of Fight for Children and the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. He holds a BA from Yale and an MPP from the Kennedy School and a J.D. from the Harvard Law School, as well as a number of awards and honorary degrees, including Governing Magazine Public Official of the Year in 1997. He is a fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration and former President of the National League of Cities.
Global Advisory Council
CEOs for Cities Global Advisory Council consists of very distinguished urban leaders and thinkers who make themselves available to CEOs for Cities for strategic guidance and advice on a wide variety of issues critical to city success.
Henry G. Cisneros
Executive Chairman, CityView
Henry Cisneros is Executive Chairman of the CityView companies, which work with the nation’s leading homebuilders to create homes priced within the range of average families. CityView is a partner in building 40 communities in 12 states, incorporating more than 7,000 homes with a home value of over $2 billion. After serving three terms as a City Councilmember, in 1981, Mr. Cisneros became the first Hispanic-American mayor of a major U.S. city, San Antonio, Texas. During his four terms as Mayor, he helped rebuild the city’s economic base and spurred the creation of jobs through massive infrastructure and downtown improvements, marking San Antonio as one of the nation’s most progressive cities. In 1984, Mr. Cisneros was interviewed by the Democratic Presidential nominee as a possible candidate for Vice President of the United States and in 1986 was selected as the “Outstanding Mayor” in the nation by City and State Magazine. In 1992, President Clinton appointed Mr. Cisneros to be Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. After leaving HUD in 1997, Mr. Cisneros was president and chief operating officer of Univision Communications, the Spanish-language broadcaster which has become the fifth-most-watched television network in the nation. Mr. Cisneros currently serves on Univision’s Board of Directors. Mr. Cisneros has also been author, editor or collaborator in several books including: Interwoven Destinies: Cities and the Nation. His book project with former HUD Secretary Jack Kemp, Opportunity and Progress: A Bipartisan Platform for National Housing Policy, was presented the Common Purpose Award for demonstrating the potential of bipartisan cooperation and Casa y Comunidad: Latino Home and Neighborhood Design was awarded the Benjamin Franklin Silver Medal in the category of best business book of 2006.
Edward Glaeser
Professor, Harvard University; Author, The Triumph of the City
Edward Glaeser is the Fred and Eleanor Glimp Professor of Economics in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences at Harvard University, where he has taught since 1992. He is Director of the Taubman Center for State and Local Government and Director of the Rappaport Institute of Greater Boston. He regularly teaches microeconomic theory, and occasionally urban and public economics. He has published dozens of papers on cities, economic growth, and law and economics and is the autor of The Triumph of the City. In particular, his work has focused on the determinants of city growth and the role of cities as centers of idea transmission. He received his PhD from the University of Chicago in 1992.
Rosabeth Moss Kanter
Professor, Harvard Business School
Rosabeth Moss Kanter holds the Ernest L. Arbuckle Professorship at Harvard Business School, where she specializes in strategy, innovation, and leadership for change. She is also Chair and Director of the Harvard University Advanced Leadership Initiative, a collaboration across Harvard's professional schools to help successful leaders at the top of their professions apply their skills to addressing challenging national and global problems in their next stages of life. Her strategic and practical insights have guided leaders of large and small organizations worldwide for over 25 years, through teaching, writing, and direct consultation to major corporations and governments. Rosabeth has been repeatedly named to lists of the “50 Most Powerful Women in the World” (Times of London), and the “50 Most Influential Business Thinkers in the World” (Thinkers50). She is the author or co-author of 18 books. Her latest book, SuperCorp: How Vanguard Companies Create Innovation, Profits, Growth, and Social Good, a manifesto for leadership of sustainable enterprises, was named one of the ten best business books of 2009 by Amazon.com.
Bruce Mau
Co-Founder of Massive Change Network, Bruce Mau Live and Founder and Chairman Emeritus of Bruce Mau Design
World-leading visionary, innovator, designer, and author, Bruce Mau is committed to creative, healthy, ecological and economic abundance. Informed by 25 years of studio experience in design innovation and collaboration with some of the world’s leading artists, institutions and businesses, Bruce Mau has made the simple commitment to connect his life and work to education and human development. Mau is Co-Founder of Massive Change Network. This new initiative is committed to developing purposeful projects in education, health, leadership, and security. Bruce Mau founded the Institute without Boundaries – an innovative, studio-based postgraduate program in collaboration with George Brown College, Toronto. Mau and his students created the groundbreaking exhibition and best-selling book, Massive Change (Phaidon) — a project that declared, “Massive Change is not about the world of design; it’s about the design of the world.” Bruce Mau’s most recent book, The Third Teacher (Abrams) which he and his studio co-authored with OWP/P Architects and VS Furniture, presents a compendium of ways that design can transform teaching and learning for students, families and teachers to thrive in tomorrow’s world. Mau is an author and designer of award-winning books, including LifeStyle (Phaidon), S,M,L,XL (The Monacelli Press) in collaboration with Rem Koolhaas, and the iconic and celebrated ZONE BOOKS series. Translated into several languages, Mau’s Incomplete Manifesto for Growth has been an inspiration with his aphoristic articulation of his personal philosophy and design strategies for unleashing creativity. Bruce Mau’s design philosophies and practical applications featured in the recently released book GLIMMER: How Design Can Transform Your Life and Maybe the World by Warren Berger (Penguin Press).
Carlo Ratti
Director, MIT SENSEable City Lab
Carlo Ratti is an Italian architect and engineer who also teaches at MIT, where he directs the SENSEable City Lab. Carlo has co-authored over 200 publications and holds several patents. His work has been exhibited at the Venice Biennale and MoMA in New York. At the 2008 World Expo, his Digital Water Pavilion was hailed by Time Magazine as one of the “Best Inventions of the Year”. He has been included in Blueprint Magazine's “25 People Who Will Change the World of Design”, Fast Company’s “50 Most Influential Designers in America”, and has presented at TED (2011).