Sean Kershaw, President

In April of 2003, Sean Kershaw became just the sixth Citizens League president in its over 50 year history. Sean has been a member of the Citizens League Board since 1996, and co-chaired the Citizens League's 50th Anniversary report on Doing the Common Good Better.

Sean left his position as a Deputy Director for the City of St. Paul's Department of Planning and Economic Development (PED), where he had worked for 11 years. During his tenure, Sean chaired then Mayor Norm Coleman's e-Government initiative and coordinated Coleman's information technology, charter school, and education initiatives. Sean even worked as community outreach coordinator on the Mayor's Y2K initiative. Within PED, Sean worked as a project manager of a variety of housing initiatives, developed and managed the City's Small Business Resource Center, and led several reorganization efforts to improve teamwork, efficienct and contact with the comminuty. Prior to that, he was planning coordinator for the Public Housing Authority in his hometown of Omaha Nebraska.

Sean is passionate about active citizenship and civic organizing. He is a founding member and current board member of Civics Incorporated, a young-adult civic leadershp program that is affiliated with the Statewide Active Citizenship Institute.

Sean has a BA from Haverford College. He resides in the "Uppertown" section of St. Paul's West Seventh neighborhood with his partner Tim Hawkins and their son Aidan.

Sean describes his current role with the Citizens League as his 'dream job'. "To be able to work on such important issues, with the passion and wisdom of League members and the civic leadership in our community, is energizing and exciting," Sean says.

Bob DeBoer, Program Associate

Bob DeBoer is the League's Program Associate and lead policy analyst.

DeBoer was director of communications at the Office of the State Auditor and committee administrator at the Minnesota House of Representatives for the Committee on Taxes and the Committee on Local Government and Metropolitan Affairs.

At the House, he worked on a broad variety of issues including:

• property taxes
• health care
• tax incentives & economic development
• energy & environmental tax policy
• price of government
• youth tobacco prevention
• stadium financing options
• K-12 education

He also has experience as a journalist, market researcher, and as a health care manager and worker.

Most recently, DeBoer worked as a consultant, producing a report on the efficiency of the state lottery in April 2003.

DeBoer received a Bachelor of Arts in Speech-Communication from the University of Minnesota, and completed coursework in state-local fiscal relations and economic development at the Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs.

DeBoer resides with his wife, Katie, and three children in St. Paul.

Victoria Ford , Program Associate

Victoria Ford joined the League staff as a Program Associate in the fall of 2004. Ford, a native of Minneapolis, came to the League upon returning to Minnesota after a stint in Washington, D.C.

In D.C., Ford held a fellowship at the Center for Democracy and the Third Sector at Georgetown University. Her research was on the relationships between civic participation and democracy; sadly, her findings were entirely inconclusive. Previously, Ford worked in research at the Urban Institute's Justice Policy Center and the University of Minnesota School of Public Health.

Ford has also worked extensively with neighborhood organizations, through the Center for Urban and Regional Affairs at the University of Minnesota.

Ford holds a Master of Public Policy from Georgetown University and a Bachelor of Arts in Geography from the University of Minnesota. She resides in the Crocus Hill neighborhood of Saint Paul.

Cal Clark, Volunteer Development Director

Cal Clark has recently re-joined the League staff as a volunteer to work on League development work.  This is a second round of work for Cal, who was also on the staff from January 1, 1970 to December 31, 1980. During that time, he staffed 11 committee studies along with working on development. Cal's exposure to the Citizens League goes back to the mid 1960s. While working for a national non-profit organization that focused on improving the rules, procedures and organization of the 50 state legislatures, Cal did a study of which states were doing the best job of addressing urban issues in a creative way. Two states stood out in Cal's study: California and Minnesota. Further inquiry found that California's leadership was based on a progressive heritage and their having a full-time, highly staffed professional legislature. In Minnesota, Cal traced its creative leadership to a progressive heritage, and the implementation of ideas developed by a group called the Citizens League. Cal is currently spearheading one of the largest development campaigns in the Citizens League's 50 year history.  While reflecting on his current volunteer work, he stated, "Former Minnesota Governor Elmer Andersen once told me you should never ask someone to give until it hurts, but you should always encourage them to give until they really feel good about themselves." "I really feel good about what I am able to do for the Citizens League," says Cal, "and you can be sure that I will be doing my very best to extend that good feeling as widely as possible among current and potential League members."

• Trudy Koroschetz, Administrative Staff
• J. Trout Lowen, Editor, Minnesota Journal