Board of Directors

Phil Straus

Chair

Phil is a photographer. He straddles the digital/analog border with a 4X5 camera and film, scanning, Photoshop, and toned silver prints. For dozens of thousand-word equivalents answering the question, "What does he photograph?" see his website, at www.strausphoto.com.

Phil is on the board of directors of the Center for Defense Information where he's underwritten the launch of the Straus Military Reform Project. He is supporting a MotherJones.com project on militarism.

He's recently begun playing the piano and composing music and returned to running after a ten-year lapse due to now-eliminated arthritis. He's looking forward to a return to the study of mathematics. Phil has been a devoted go player for over 35 years.

He lives in Philadelphia with his wife, Margaret Harris. They've recently become empty-nesters. Phil has degrees in psychology and engineering. For other details of his past life, ask his cousin, Jane Butcher.

Madeleine Buckingham

President

Buckingham became president and CEO in February 2010. Prior to this she held the position of COO/CFO; she joined Mother Jones in 2002. She has spent more than 20 years in senior finance and management positions in the publishing and high-tech industries working for a range of publishing companies and Internet startups, including Sony Corp.'s Internet incubator and at International Data Group.

Monika Bauerlein

Vice President

Monika Bauerlein is co-editor of Mother Jones, where, together with Clara Jeffery, she spearheaded an era of editorial growth and innovation, marked by two National Magazine Awards for general excellence, the addition of a seven-person Washington Bureau, and an overhaul of the organization’s digital strategy that tripled MotherJones.com's traffic. Previously she was Mother Jones’ investigative editor, focusing on long-form projects marrying in-depth reportage, document sleuthing, and narrative appeal. She has also worked as an alternative-weekly editor (at Minneapolis/St. Paul’s City Pages), a correspondent for US and European publications in Washington, D.C. and at the United Nations, an AP stringer, corporate trainer, translator, and pastry chef (a very short stint). She lives in Oakland with her husband and their three children.

Clara Jeffery

Vice President

Clara Jeffery is co-editor of Mother Jones, where, together with Monika Bauerlein, she has spearheaded an era of editorial growth and innovation, marked by the addition of an eight-person Washington bureau, an overhaul of the organization's digital strategy and a corresponding tripling of traffic, and the winning of two National Magazine Awards for general excellence. Before joining the staff of Mother Jones, she was a senior editor of Harper's magazine. Eight pieces that she personally edited have been finalists for National Magazine Awards, in the categories of essay, profile, reporting, public interest, and fiction. Works she edited have also been selected to appear in various editions of Best American Essays, Best American Travel Writing, Best American Sports Writing, and Best American Science Writing. Clara cut her journalistic teeth at Washington City Paper, where she wrote and edited political, investigative, and narrative features, and was a columnist. Jeffery is a graduate of Carleton College and Northwestern's Medill School of Journalism. Born in Baltimore and raised in Arlington, Virginia, she now resides in the Mission District of San Francisco with her partner Chris Baum and their two-year-old son Milo. Their burrito joint of choice is El Metate.

Steven Katz

Vice President

Steven Katz is Publisher for Mother Jones and its non-profit publisher, the Foundation for National Progress. He joined MoJo in 2003 after several years as Vice President of Development for Earthjustice, the nation's leading non-profit environmental law firm. While at Mother Jones, Steve helped found and was the first Project Director for The Media Consortium, a network of more than 40 independent, progressive media organizations around the United States.

Steve has thirty years' experience working in the fields of the environment advocacy, the arts, social justice, and neighborhood-based housing development. Prior to joining Earthjustice in 1995, he was Managing Director for the California urban environmental advocacy organization, Communities for a Better Environment, from 1989 to 1994. During the mid and late 1980s, Steve worked in the non-profit arts world, including three years as Managing Director for the San Francisco-based touring ensemble, A Traveling Jewish Theatre. He also was Associate Director for Housing and Planning at Brooklyn's Flatbush Development Corporation for two years in the early 1980s, and Development Coordinator for the Bronx-based sweat equity urban homesteading group, People's Development Corporation, from 1976 to 1978.

Steve has been on a number of non-profit boards, among them Earthshare of California, the As You Sow Foundation, the Marin Center for Peace and Justice, and Turtle Island Restoration Network. Steve received his PhD in Sociology from the University of California at Santa Cruz in 1987, and his B.A. from Oberlin College in 1974. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife Rachelle, and his son, Noah.

Sara Frankel

Secretary

Sara Frankel has worked in media companies since starting her first job as a Mother Jones intern in 1986. She subsequently worked as an editor and feature writer for both weekly magazines and a daily newspaper. Since receiving her MBA in 1994, she has held a range of business positions in electronic media companies, most recently running an Internet company she founded in 1999. She is currently working as a business consultant in New York.

Harriett Levin Balkind

For 25+ years Harriett was a partner at New York based Frankfurt Balkind, an award -winning brand strategy and communications agency with offices in San Francisco and Los Angeles. Known for its innovative integrated approach, the agency was purchased by Interpublic/Hill Holliday during 2002. At Frankfurt Balkind, Harriett was responsible for business development and led client liaison and brand strategy teams for companies whose needs required multi-disciplinary marketing – identity, print, video, digital, web. Clients ranged from AT&T, Avon, Saks Fifth Avenue, Pitney Bowes, Hearst, Goldman Sachs, HBO, and Sony to the MTA (Grand Central Station) and New Visions for Public Schools.

Today Harriett is co-founder of Strat B in New York, providing brand strategy, messaging and marketing communications for established companies such as Time Warner Cable Media and start-ups like Cindy Levine Group. She is a partner of Bemis Balkind, a premier Los Angeles based entertainment marketing agency.

Harriett’s career began in San Francisco where she lived for 13 years and worked in retail and banking prior to joining Landor Associates, a brand and creative design consultancy. Moving to New York, she headed advertising and public relations for Reeves Communications, who later became one of her first clients when she started Levin Associates; the other was Gips+Balkind design firm, subsequently, Frankfurt Balkind. Harriett has been published in industry publications such as Communication Arts, Graphic Design: USA, and Direct Marketing News. She has a monthly blog-azine, "Secrets no one ever told you," www.snoety.com, directed primarily to 45+ women who are interested in new ideas and thoughts on living, and she serves on the Industry Council of Eurica Media Lab. She has one son, Devin, who is 25 and lives in Brooklyn.

Harriet Barlow

Harriet is the director of the HKH Foundation, which makes grants in areas relating to the environment, the arms race, and civil liberties, and is also director of the Blue Mountain Center, an upstate New York workplace for artists, writers and activists. Ms. Barlow has also founded and co-founded 12 public interest organizations and has been a member of the board of directors of over 50 non-profits.

Nick Baumann

Staff Representative

Nick is based in our DC bureau, where he covers national politics and civil liberties issues. Nick's writing has also appeared in The Economist, The Washington Monthly, and Commonweal.

Jane Butcher

Jane is co-Chair of the Conference on World Affairs, Chair of the Dean's Advisory Committee for Arts and Sciences at the University of Colorado, is on the Advisory Board of the Autry National Center and also on the Biotech Advisory Board at the University of Colorado. She is the founder of the consulting firm Conventional Wisdom, Ltd.

Andre Carothers

Andre Carothers has more than 25 years experience in non-profit management, philanthropy, program development, and organizational and leadership development. He is currently an independent consultant. He is the co-founder, former Executive Director, and now a Senior Fellow at the Rockwood Leadership Institute, a national non-profit training and consulting organization. He serves as Chairman of the Board of the Rainforest Action Network and is a Board Member of International Rivers. He is also senior adviser to the Weinmann Charitable Trust, and Executive Director of the Furthur Foundation and the New Place Fund. From 1984 to 1997 he worked at Greenpeace USA as editor of their national newsmagazine, campaign manager and member of the Board of Directors. He was a regular columnist for “E” Magazine and has written extensively on environment and civic issues for many publications. He has authored numerous reports, articles and conference presentations on topics ranging from the economics of timber extraction in Papua New Guinea to the integration of spiritual practice into social activism. He received an MA in environmental science from the Energy and Resources Group at the University of California, Berkeley.

Diane Filippi

Diane Filippi is the Director of the SPUR Urban Center in San Francisco. Prior to joining SPUR, Ms. Filippi was a founder and Managing Principal of SMWM, an architectural and urban design firm in San Francisco.

As the Director of the SPUR Urban Center, Diane has been a guest speaker on Urban Centers to national and international audiences.

A few of Diane's other activities include:
Chair, Rail-volution, Washington DC and Portland, Oregon - current
Board Member, Association of Architectural Organizations, Chicago - current
Board Member, ULI District Council - current
Chair, Urban Land Institute, San Francisco District Council
Board Member, San Francisco Chamber of Commerce
Chair, San Francisco Friends of the Library
Chair, Keep Libraries Alive Political Campaign
Chair, State of California Friends of the Library
Chair, Libraries for the Future, New York

For the past 8 years, Diane has been named one of San Francisco's 100 Most Influential Women. In 2010, she was honored as a permanent member of San Francisco Most Influential Women Hall of Fame.

In 1996, Mayor Willie L. Brown, Jr. in recognition of service to the people of San Francisco and the San Francisco Public Library, declared February 20 to be Diane Filippi Day in San Francisco.

Dave Glassco

Dave is a self-described "father, geek, and musician who lives in Austin, Texas." He is a Texas native, and true to the Austin ethos, he's creative, passionate, and active in his community.

Dave graduated from the University of Texas with a degree in government. He's performed as a keyboardist, bassist, and guitarist, even attending Berklee College of Music after UT. He returned to Austin to open his own studio, Satellite Studio, and enter the tech consulting and web development field. Dave is on the board of Miro, an open-source video project. He is also very active in Texas and national politics, working with Texans Together and Stand Up Texas.

Erik Hanisch

Erik is a co-founder and president of the Seattle-based Quixote Foundation. The Quixote Foundation was founded in 1997 by Erik's father, Arthur, to advance progressive causes through the action, education & policy work of dynamic nonprofit groups. Erik's wife, Lenore is the Executive Director of the Quixote Foundation.

Adam Hochschild

Adam is a writer and was one of the co-founders of Mother Jones. He is the author of seven books: Half the Way Home: a Memoir of Father and Son; The Mirror at Midnight: a South African Journey; The Unquiet Ghost: Russians Remember Stalin; Finding the Trapdoor: Essays, Portraits, Travels; King Leopold's Ghost: a Story of Greed, Terror and Heroism in Colonial Africa; Bury the Chains: Prophets and Rebels in the Fight to Free an Empire's Slaves; and To End All Wars: A Story of Loyalty and Rebellion, 1914-1918. In 1997-98, he spent five months as a Fulbright Lecturer in India, and he teaches a writing class at the Graduate School of Journalism at the University of California at Berkeley.

Kim Keller

Since 2006, Kim Keller has worked in the field of Public Health Policy and Research. She is a member of The Philanthropy Workshop West and on the board of the David & Anita Keller Family Foundation, a family foundation committed to human rights as the cornerstone to peace and justice as well as political, social, and economic development. Ms. Keller is a graduate of Wellesley College and the London School of Economics, where she earned a Masters of Science in Health, Population, and Society.

Richard Melcher

Rick is a founding principal of Melcher & Tucker Consultants, a Chicago-based strategic marketing and communications firm advising small and midsize companies and not-for-profit organizations. Since he co-founded the business in 2000, Rick has helped clients with strategic planning, media and capital campaigns, and in building alliances. Prior to his current endeavors, Rick worked at two leading public policy web sites, and spent two decades at Business Week magazine, managing bureaus in Chicago and London, and where he received the Citation for Excellence from the Overseas Press Club for reporting on Europe and the Center for Education Reform's award for Excellence in Journalism.

Rick is a board member of the Foundation for National Progress, and serves on the national board of trustees and the Chicago advisory board of Facing History and Ourselves. He is also on the executive committee of the board of directors of Chicago Commons and is a member of the Economic Club of Chicago and the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations. A graduate of Duke University, Rick and his wife, Barbara, are the parents of three children.

Hope Morrissett

Hope Morrissett received a BA from the University of Colorado in a combined major in Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology, Chemistry and Economics. She returned to academics to pursue a PhD in Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology when she became pregnant with her first child, who was born with a severe genetic problem and died as a 3 month old.

Based on an experiential playgroup, she founded a school which is now turning 20 years old and has 170 children attending from pre-school through fifth grade. The school now has an intern program in association with a master's program at the University of Denver, which trains teachers in the schools' methods and philosophy.

She has also attended a hands-on healing school in New York for three years on long weekends, and spent two subsequent years there as an apprentice teacher. She is now at the point where she is ready to work to shape the world to help create a different future than the one we may be careening toward.

Carolyn Mugar

Carolyn Mugar is and has been for twenty years the Executive Director of Farm Aid. Previous to that, she was an organizer with the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers International Union and the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers International Union. Both unions have since merged several times. She also founded the Armenia Tree Project based in Watertown Massachusetts and Yerevan, Armenia and is very active on Armenian issues, going back and forth to Armenia several times a year. She likes to bike a lot. She walked the whole Camino in Spain over four years ago. She went to college and received a higher education.

Jon Pageler

Jon Pageler has been a Vice President of Diageo, the world's leading premium drinks company, since 2003 and is currently responsible for Marketing Communications. At Diageo, Mr. Pageler's responsibilities include overseeing the marketing communications efforts in North America, as well as coordinating these efforts with the other Diageo markets worldwide. Prior to becoming the Head of Marketing Communications for North America, Mr. Pageler served as the Brand Communications Strategist in Diageo's world Headquarters in London.

Mr. Pageler began his tenure with Diageo in Napa, as the Diageo Chateau & Estate Wine Company's executive in charge of Corporate Relations in the role of Vice President Corporate Relations, Diageo Chateau & Estate Wines.

From 2000 to 2003, prior to joining Diageo, Mr. Pageler worked for the Crisis Management and Strategic Communications firm, Westhill Partners, where, among other responsibilities, he managed the firm's largest client, Diageo. Mr. Pageler came to Westhill from his role as Scheduler and, ultimately, Trip Director on the Bill Bradley for President Campaign, where he served for two years. From 1995 through 1998, Mr. Pageler held positions on several political campaigns including as the Scheduler for Charles Schumer's successful bid to unseat US Senator Al Damato and as Campaign Manager for Charlie King's unsuccessful bid for New York State Lieutenant Governor.

Prior to that Mr. Pageler worked for the American Red Cross as a communications specialist and as an Investigator for the Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem, a non-profit criminal defense firm based on 125th Street in Manhattan.

Mr. Pageler graduated with honors and a BA in Philosophy from Carleton College in Northfield Minnesota in 1990.

Susan S. Pritzker

Susan has been active in the arts, education, civil rights and women's issues for most of her life. She has been a on the board of Pitzer College since 1990 and the chair since 2001. She also serves on the board of directors of Chicago-based Urban Gateways: Center for the Arts in Education, the largest arts-in-education organization in Cook County, Ill. Urban Gateways reinforces the arts curriculum in Chicago public and parochial schools by sponsoring artists to teach visual arts, dance, theater and music. Susan is also chair of the board of directors of the Chicago Foundation for Women, whose goal is to increase philanthropic giving by women for a variety of causes, including shelters for abused women and girls and programs on domestic violence and sexual assault. Susan is married to Nick Pritzker, whose family are owners of the Hyatt Hotel chain.

Kate Sheppard

Staff Representative

Kate Sheppard covers energy and environmental politics in Mother Jones' Washington bureau. She was previously the political reporter for Grist and a writing fellow at The American Prospect. She can be reached by email at ksheppard (at) motherjones (dot) com. Her work has also been featured in the New York Times Room for Debate blog, The Guardian's Comment is Free, High Country News, The Center for Public Integrity, The Washington Independent, ForeignPolicy.com, Washington Spectator, Who Runs Gov, In These Times, and Bitch. She was raised on a vegetable farm in southern New Jersey (yes, they do exist), but has adapted well to life in the nation's capitol. She misses trees and having a Congressional representative with voting power, but thinks D.C. is pretty great anyway.

Kevin Simmons

Kevin Simmons is the founder and co-director of two nonprofit art spaces: High Concept Laboratories (HCL), and Los Del Patio. HCL collaborates with Chicago-area artists and performers to foster the creation and development of new works, and also curates classes, screenings, lectures, and other events for the community. Los Del Patio, located in Panama City, Panama, entails a gallery, cafe/bar, center for studios and workshops, as well as professionally-oriented programming pertaining to the production and presentation of contemporary art. He is the president of Opera Cabal, a Chicago-based avant-garde contemporary opera company, and in addition to serving on the board of the Foundation for National Progress / Mother Jones Magazine, he is a board member of Molly Shanahan / Mad Shak Dance Company, The Canary Project, and the Azuero Earth Project. A former AmeriCorps*VISTA Site DIrector with LIFT, he studied political science and public policy at Princeton University and has worked in development and programming for a variety of environmental projects in Panama, including the Panama Rainforest Discovery Center and the Frank Gehry-designed BioMuseo / Museum of Biodiversity in collaboration with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute.