Jennifer Pahlka

Jennifer Pahlka

Pahlka speaking at the DFID/Omidyar Network Open Up! conference in 2012
Deputy Chief Technology Officer of the United States
Incumbent
Assumed office 30 May 2013
President	Barack Obama
Personal details
Born	1969 (age 45–46) Port Deposit, Maryland, U.S.
Occupation	Executive Director of Code for America

Jennifer Pahlka (born 1969) is the founder and Executive Director of Code for America. Previously she had worked at CMP Media with various roles in the computer game industry. She was the co-chair and general manager of the Web 2.0 conferences.

Personal life

She was born in Port Deposit, Maryland, and raised in Austin, New Haven, and New York City. She is a graduate of the Bronx High School of Science and Yale University, and lives in Oakland, California, with her daughter, her husband, and eight chickens.^[1] On 11 April 2015 she married Tim O'Reilly.^[2]

Career

Before founding Code for America, Pahlka spent eight years at CMP Media (now part of United Business Media), where she led the Game Group, responsible for the Game Developers Conference (GDC), Game Developer Magazine, and Gamasutra.com. She oversaw the dramatic growth of GDC from 1995 to 2003, and launched the Independent Games Festival and the Game Developers Choice Awards. She was also the executive director of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA), an independent non-profit association serving game developers around the world. During this time she also served on the advisory boards of the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) and the GDC, and on the board of directors of the IGDA.^[3]

More recently, from 2005 to 2009, she was the co-chair and general manager of the Web 2.0 events for TechWeb, a division of United Business Media, in partnership with O'Reilly Media. In that role, she proposed the creation of the Web 2.0 Expo, and became the co-chair for the event. She also played a key role in managing the Gov 2.0 Summit and Gov 2.0 Expo.^[4]

In her role at the White House, Pahlka was responsible for the Presidential Innovation Fellows program and for other programs designed to use technology to improve the citizen experience of government. She set in motion the creation of the United States Digital Service within the Executive Office of the President, and helped start 18F at the General Services Administration.^[5]

Code for America

Code for America is a San Francisco-based non-profit organization that, according to the Washington Post, "is the technology world’s equivalent of the Peace Corps or Teach for America… [offering] an alternative to the old, broken path of government IT." ^[6] In her 2012 TED Talk, Palhlka noted that we will not be able to reinvent government unless we also reinvent citizenship, and asked "Are we just going to be a crowd of voices, or are we going to be a crowd of hands?" ^[7]

Deputy United States Chief Technology Officer

After organizing Code for America fellowships for others on the local government level, Pahlka described the opportunity to serve in the federal government as her "own fellowship year of sorts.".^[8] Federal CTO Todd Park originally tried to recruit Pahlka to run the Presidential Innovation Fellows, a program loosely modeled on Code for America. In her role as Deputy US CTO she managed Round 2 of the program and organized the creation of Round 3,^[9]^[10] but her principal goal during her year at the White House was to create something more equivalent to the UK's Government Digital Service. Her efforts led to the launch of the United States Digital Service as part of the Office of Management and Budget, and 18F at the General Services Administration.

Recognition

For her work re-imagining government for the 21st century, Pahlka was named a 2011 HuffPost Gamechanger.^[11] Code for America also received a $1.5 million grant from Google as part of its 2011 Google Gives Back program.^[12] She was a celebrity judge for the Federal Communications Commission's Apps for Community contest, along with Marc Andreessen and Newark Mayor Cory Booker.^[13] She was elected an Ashoka Fellow in 2012.^[14] She also gave a keynote speech at South By Southwest Interactive in 2012.^[15]

East Bay Mini Maker Faire

Pahlka is also a co-founder, with Sabrina Merlo and Corey Weinstein, of the East Bay Mini Maker Faire.^[16] In comments to The Huffington Post, she made explicit the connection between her work on open government and the Maker movement, saying, "There is a certain generation who have grown up being able to mash up, to tinker with, every system they've ever encountered. So they are meeting their relationship with government in a new way, with a new assumption: We can fix it."^[17] The East Bay Mini Maker Faire currently attracts around 7,000 people annually. ^[18]

References

↑ Speaker Biography for Web 2.0 Expo
↑ "Tim O'Reilly on Twitter: "Last night at the reception for my wedding to the incomparable @pahlkadot!". Retrieved 2015-04-19.
↑ Speaker Biography for Web 2.0 Expo
↑ Speaker Biography for Web 2.0 Expo
↑ How the US Digital Service Could Upset DC's IT Vendor Ecosystem
↑ Code for America: An elegant solution for government IT problems, Vivek Wadhwa, The Washington Post, December 18, 2011
↑ Coding a Better Government, TED.com
↑ Pahlka was named deputy CTO for government innovation
↑ New Round of Innovators Joins US Government to Tackle Big Challenges
↑ Inside the Presidential Innovation Fellows program: A Q&A with the White House
↑ HuffPost's 2011 Game Changers: This Year's Ultimate 12, Arianna Huffington, The Huffington Post, October 26, 2011
↑ Code For America Receives $1.5M Grant From Google To Help The Government Harness Technology, Leena Rao, Techcrunch, December 14, 2011
↑ Apps for Community: Judging
↑ "Jennifer Pahlka". Ashoka Fellows. Ashoka. Retrieved 24 October 2014.
↑ Code for America's Jennifer Pahlka to Inspire with SXSW Interactive Keynote
↑ East Bay Mini Maker Faire
↑ HuffPost's 2011 Game Changers: This Year's Ultimate 12, Arianna Huffington, The Huffington Post, October 26, 2011
↑ O'Brien, Matt (2015-04-16). "Jennifer Pahlka, founder of Code for America, talks 'civic hacking'". San Jose Mercury News. Retrieved 2015-04-19.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Jennifer Pahlka.

Code for America official website
Civic Commons, a project of Code for America
East Bay Mini Maker Faire
Changing Government and Tech with Geeks, Nick Bilton, The New York Times, July 6, 2010
How an Army of Techies Is Taking on City Hall, Anya Kamenetz, Fast Company, November 29, 2010
Innovator: Jennifer Pahlka, John Tozzi, Business Week, April 7, 2011
Remaking Government in a Wiki Age, Chrystia Freeland/Reuters, The New York Times, August 18, 2011
HuffPost's 2011 Game Changers: This Year's Ultimate 12, Arianna Huffington, The Huffington Post, October 26, 2011
Apps for Community: Judging
Code For America Receives $1.5M Grant From Google To Help The Government Harness Technology, Leena Rao, Techcrunch, December 14, 2011
Code for America: An elegant solution for government IT problems, Vivek Wadhwa, The Washington Post, December 18, 2011
Possum problems and building better government: Jennifer Pahlka at TED2012, TED Blog, February 29, 2012
TED Video Coding a Better Government, TED.com
Jennifer Pahlka is named one of Government Technology's magazine Top 25: Doers, Dreamers and Drivers of 2012.

Barack Obama's Executive Office of the President

Office	Name	Term	Office	Name	Term
White House Chief of Staff White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy	Rahm Emanuel Pete Rouse William M. Daley Jack Lew Denis R. McDonough Mona Sutphen Nancy-Ann DeParle Rob Nabors	2009–10 2010–11 2011–12 2012–13 2013– 2009–11 2011–13 2013–15	National Security Advisor Deputy National Security Advisor Deputy National Security Advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan	Jim Jones Thomas E. Donilon Susan Rice Thomas E. Donilon Denis McDonough Tony Blinken Avril Haines Douglas Lute^†	2009–10 2010–13 2013– 2009–10 2010–13 2013–14 2015– 2009–13
White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations	Jim Messina Alyssa Mastromonaco Anita Decker Breckenridge	2009–11 2011–14 2014–	Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications Deputy National Security Advisor for Homeland Security	Ben Rhodes John O. Brennan Lisa Monaco	2009– 2009–13 2013–
White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Planning	Mark B. Childress Kristie Canegallo	2012–14 2014–	Deputy National Security Advisor and NSC Chief of Staff	Denis McDonough Brooke Anderson	2009–10 2011–12
Senior Advisor to the President	David Axelrod David Plouffe Daniel Pfeiffer	2009–11 2011–13 2013–15	White House Communications Director	Daniel Pfeiffer Jennifer Palmieri Jen Psaki	2009–13 2013–15 2015–
Senior Advisor to the President Counselor to the President	Pete Rouse Brian Deese Pete Rouse John Podesta	2009–10 2015– 2011–13 2014–15	Deputy White House Communications Director	Jen Psaki Jennifer Palmieri Amy Brundage	2009–11 2011–14 2014–
Senior Advisor to the President and Assistant to the President for Public Engagement and Intergovernmental Affairs Director of Public Engagement Director of Intergovernmental Affairs Director, National Economic Council	Valerie Jarrett Christina Tchen Jon Carson Paulette Aniskoff Cecilia Muñoz David Agnew Jerry Abramson Lawrence Summers Gene Sperling Jeffrey Zients	2009– 2009–11 2011–13 2013– 2009–12 2012–14 2014– 2009–10 2011–14 2014–	White House Press Secretary Deputy Press Secretary Director of Special Projects Director of Speechwriting White House Counsel	Robert Gibbs Jay Carney Josh Earnest Bill Burton Josh Earnest Eric Schultz Stephanie Cutter Jon Favreau Cody Keenan Greg Craig Robert Bauer Kathryn Ruemmler W. Neil Eggleston	2009–11 2011–13 2013– 2009–11 2011–13 2014– 2010–11 2009–13 2013– 2009–10 2010–11 2011–14 2014–
Deputy Director, National Economic Council Deputy Director, National Economic Council Chair of the President's Economic Recovery Advisory Board	Diana Farrell Brian Deese Jason Furman Paul Volcker	2009–11 2011–13 2009–13 2009–11	Assistant to the President for Legislative Affairs	Phil Schiliro Rob Nabors Miguel Rodriguez Katie Beirne Fallon	2009–11 2011–13 2013 2013–
Chair of the Council of Economic Advisors	Christina Romer Austan Goolsbee Jason Furman	2009–10 2010–13 2013–	Deputy Assistant to the President for Legislative Affairs	Lisa Konwinski Amy Rosenbaum	2009– 2014–
Member of the Council of Economic Advisors	Katharine Abraham	2011–	Executive Clerk	George T. Saunders^† David Kalbaugh	2009–12 2012–
Member of the Council of Economic Advisors	Cecilia Rouse	2009–	Director, Office of Political Affairs	Patrick Gaspard David Simas	2009–11 2013–
Director, Office of Management and Budget	Peter R. Orszag Jack Lew Jeffrey Zients Sylvia Mathews Burwell Brian Deese Shaun Donovan	2009–10 2010–12 2012–13 2013–14 2014 2014–	Chief Technology Officer Chief Information Officer	Aneesh Chopra Todd Park Megan Smith Vivek Kundra Steven VanRoekel Tony Scott	2009–12 2012–14 2014– 2009–11 2011–14 2015–
Chief Performance Officer and Deputy Director for Management, Office of Management and Budget	Jeffrey Zients	2009–13	Director, Office of Presidential Personnel	Nancy Hogan Johnathan McBride	2010–14 2014–
Deputy Director, Office of Management and Budget	Jeffrey Liebman Heather Higginbottom Brian Deese	2010 2011–13 2013–15	Director of Scheduling and Advance Director, White House Military Office	Alyssa Mastromonaco Danielle White Crutchfield George D. Mulligan, Jr. Emmett Beliveau	2009–11 2011– 2009–13 2013–
United States Trade Representative	Ron Kirk Michael Froman	2009–13 2013–	Cabinet Secretary	Chris Lu Broderick Johnson	2009–13 2013–
Director, Domestic Policy Council	Melody Barnes Cecilia Muñoz	2009–12 2012–	Deputy Cabinet Secretary	Liz Sears Smith Rachana Bhowmik Michael Robertson	2009–11 2011–13 2013–
Deputy Director, Domestic Policy Council	Heather Higginbottom Mark Zuckerman	2009–11 2011–	Staff Secretary	Lisa Brown Rajesh De Douglas Kramer Joani Walsh	2009–11 2011–12 2012–13 2014–
Director, Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships	Joshua DuBois Melissa Rogers	2009–2013 2013–	Assistant to the President for Management and Administration	Bradley Kiley Katy Kale	2009–13 2013–
Director, Office of Health Reform	Nancy-Ann DeParle	2009–11	Director, Oval Office Operations	Micaela Fernandez Brian Mosteller	2009–12 2012–
Deputy Director, Office of Health Reform	Jeanne Lambrew	2009–	Personal Aide to the President	Reggie Love Marvin Nicholson	2009–11 2011–
Director, Office of Energy and Climate Change Policy	Carol Browner	2009–11	Personal Secretary to the President	Katie Johnson Anita Decker Breckenridge Ferial Govashiri	2009–11 2011–14 2014–
Deputy Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change	Heather Zichal Dan Utech	2009–2013 2013–	Special Projects Coordinator and Confidential Assistant to the President	Eugene Kang	2009–11
Director, Council on Environmental Quality	Nancy Sutley Michael Boots	2009–2014 2014–	Director, Office of National AIDS Policy	Jeffrey Crowley Grant Cofax Douglas Brooks	2009–2011 2012–2014 2014–
Chief of Staff to the First Lady	Jackie Norris Susan Sher Christina Tchen	2009 2009–10 2011–	Director, Office of National Drug Control Policy	Gil Kerlikowske Michael Botticelli	2009–14 2014–
White House Social Secretary	Desirée Rogers Julianna Smoot Jeremy Bernard	2009–10 2010–11 2011–	Director, Office of Urban Affairs	Adolfo Carrión, Jr. Racquel Russell	2009–2010 2010–
Director, Office of Science and Technology Policy	John Holdren	2009–

^*Senate-confirmation pending. †Remained from previous administration (s).