Who We Are


Jennifer Pahlka (Founder and Executive Director) has spent the past 15 years in the company of the technology elite. After graduating cum laude from Yale University, she went to work in the non-profit sector, but soon found herself in the business-to-business technology media world, running the Game Developers Conference.  She spent eight years at CMP Media where she led the Game Group, overseeing GDC, Game Developer magazine, and Gamasutra.com; there she also launched the Independent Games Festival and served as Executive Director of the International Game Developers Association. Recently, she ran the Web 2.0 and Gov 2.0 events for TechWeb, in conjunction with O’Reilly Media, and co-chaired the successful Web 2.0 Expo.
Leonard Lin (Co-founder and Chief Technical Officer) is a technologist specializing in the social web and a happy dilettante in hardware hacking, data visualization, participatory politics and other such geekery. He co-founded Upcoming.org (acquired by Yahoo! in 2005), and subsequently ran Yahoo!’s Hack Day program. Most recently, he worked on web technology and social software for the Obama campaign. Prolific and highly parallel, he’s written code for Lawrence Lessig, WordPress, Metafilter, Downhill Battle, and deployed mobile location and sensor network applications for the Web 2.0 Expo and Where 2.0 conferences.

Code for America TeamJennifer Pahlka (Founder, Executive Director and Board Chair) has spent the past 15 years in the company of the technology elite. After graduating cum laude from Yale University, she went to work in the non-profit sector, but soon found herself in the business-to-business technology media world, running the Game Developers Conference.  She spent eight years at CMP Media where she led the Game Group, overseeing GDC, Game Developer magazine, and Gamasutra.com; there she also launched the Independent Games Festival and served as Executive Director of the International Game Developers Association. Recently, she ran the Web 2.0 and Gov 2.0 events for TechWeb, in conjunction with O’Reilly Media, and co-chaired the successful Web 2.0 Expo.

Code for America TeamLeonard Lin (Co-founder, Technical Advisor, and Board Chair) is a technologist specializing in the social web and a happy dilettante in hardware hacking, data visualization, participatory politics and other such geekery. He co-founded Upcoming.org (acquired by Yahoo! in 2005), and subsequently ran Yahoo!’s Hack Day program. Most recently, he worked on web technology and social software for the Obama campaign. Prolific and highly parallel, he’s written code for Lawrence Lessig, WordPress, Metafilter, Downhill Battle, and deployed mobile location and sensor network applications for the Web 2.0 Expo and Where 2.0 conferences.

Code for America TeamTim O’Reilly (Board Member) is the founder and CEO of O’Reilly Media, Inc., thought by many to be the best computer book publisher in the world. In addition to Foo Camps (“Friends of O’Reilly” Camps, which gave rise to the “un-conference” movement), O’Reilly Media also hosts conferences on technology topics, including the Web 2.0 Summit, the Web 2.0 Expo, the O’Reilly Open Source Convention, the Gov 2.0 Summit, and the Gov 2.0 Expo. Tim’s blog, the O’Reilly Radar, “watches the alpha geeks” to determine emerging technology trends, and serves as a platform for advocacy about issues of importance to the technical community. Tim’s long-term vision for his company is to change the world by spreading the knowledge of innovators.

Code for America TeamMonica Harrington (Board Member) is a business and communications strategist with a strong track record of success in both the nonprofit and private sectors. She was the founding Chief Marketing Officer for two very successful startups: 1) Valve, makers of the groundbreaking game Half-Life, which earned more than 50 Game of the Year Awards; and 2) Picnik, an innovative web-based application that has become the world’s leading online photo editor.  Monica also served as a senior policy officer at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, where she managed foundation-wide communications and served as personal media advisor for Bill and Melinda Gates.  She currently serves as a pro bono advisor to NetHope, a collaborative consortium made up CIOs and senior technical people from 28 leading international NGOs, including the Red Cross, CARE, Save the Children, World Vision, and the Nature Conservancy.

Code for America TeamAndrew Greenhill (Board Member) is the Mayor’s Chief of Staff for the City of Tucson. He has worked extensively on wide-ranging issues facing Tucson and Southern Arizona such as water, transportation, environmental sustainability, urban planning, economic development and local government reform. Andrew’s strong interest in Government 2.0–the use of technology to improve government and serve citizens–has led to the development of a number of technology initiatives both inside and outside city government. In addition to serving on the Board of Directors for Code for America, Andrew recently co-founded OpenTucson, a local non-profit where civic-minded web developers work closely with community leaders to develop applications and other technological solutions and improve Tucson’s quality of life.


Board of Advisors

Clay Johnson, Sunlight Labs
Jascha Franklin-Hodge, Blue State Digital
Peter Corbett, iStrategyLabs
Michal Migursky & Ben Cerveny, Stamen Design
Andrew Rasiej, Personal Democracy Forum
Clay Shirky, author, Here Comes Everybody

City Steering Committee

Alissa Black, City and County of San Francisco
Andrew Greenhill, Chief of Staff, Office of the Mayor of Tucson
Peter Koht, City of Santa Cruz
Dustin Haisler, CIO, City of Manor, TX
Kelly Morariu, Assistant to the City Manager, City of Palo Alto
Nigel Jacobs, Senior Advisor for Emerging Technology, Boston City Hall