Jean Ross, Senior Program Officer, Equitable Growth, The Bernard and Anne Spitzer Charitable Trust
Jean Ross joined the Bernard and Anne Spitzer Charitable Trust in March 2019 as Senior Program Officer, managing the Trust’s Equitable Growth program. Prior to joining the Trust, Jean was the Principal of Jean Ross Policy | Strategy, a consulting firm that develops effective policy campaigns and builds strong organizations to lead them. Her clients included private foundations and leading international and U.S. nonprofit organizations with a focus on fiscal and economic policy issues. She formerly served as a Program Officer in the Promoting Transparent, Effective, and Accountable Government Initiative at the Ford Foundation, managing the Initiative’s U.S. and global grantmaking. From 1995 to March 2012, she served as the first executive director of the California Budget Project, a nationally respected budget and policy organization (renamed the California Budget and Policy Center in 2015). Jean has also worked as staff to the California State Assembly’s Revenue and Taxation and Human Services Committees and as assistant research director of the Service Employees International Union, where she coordinated the union’s research on fiscal and labor market policies. Jean’s areas of expertise include policy analysis and development, strategic communications, network building, and organizational development. She is known as an effective communicator with a talent for translating complex policy issues for diverse audiences. Jean received a MCP with an emphasis on regional economics from the University of California at Berkeley (UCB) and a BA from the University of California at Santa Cruz. She was named the 2013 Distinguished Alumnus of the Year by the UCB’s College of Environmental Design and was a Senior Fellow at the University of California, Los Angeles’ Luskin School of Public Affairs in 2000-2001. She has published numerous articles, opinion pieces, and policy reports in publications including the New York Times (online), Berkeley Public Policy Press, National Academy Press, Los Angeles Times, and other publications.