1. Sam Beard
Sam Beard has dedicated his working life to public service. He has had the privilege of initiating
and then chairing programs for each of the last seven Presidents of the United States:
Presidents Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton and Bush.
In 1969, Beard founded and remains Chairman of the National Development Council (NDC), a
national non-profit organization dedicated to redeveloping urban and rural low-income
communities. NDC has initiated and run four Presidential job creation programs for Presidents
Nixon, Ford, Carter and Reagan, and has been responsible for over $100 billion of revitalization
financing, creating over 1 million jobs. NDC trains over 3,000 economic development
professionals annually. There are six major federal economic development tools in the United
States, and NDC has pioneered and helped to create two of them.
In 1972, along with Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and U.S. Senator Robert Taft, Jr., Beard co-
founded the Jefferson Awards for Public Service to create a Nobel Prize for public service. The
Jefferson Awards recognize both ordinary people who do extraordinary things and individuals
whose public service has had a broad national impact. National winners have included four
Justices of the Supreme Court, including Sandra Day O'Connor and Thurgood Marshall; seven
Secretaries of State, including Colin Powell and Cyrus Vance; as well as Alan Greenspan, Bob
Hope, Lance Armstrong and Stephen Jobs. Over 155 newspapers, television and radio stations
herald local "Unsung Heroes" the nation's largest media partnership fostering volunteerism.
Currently, the Jefferson Awards is refocusing its programming to create a "Call to Action" for
volunteering and community building at a grassroots level. Leaders at the Carnegie Endowment
and the Kennedy School at Harvard are concerned that fewer individuals are joining
organizations and volunteering.
In 2006, Beard founded the non-profit, GIFT, the Global Investment Foundation for Tomorrow.
The goal of GIFT is to encourage individuals, non-profits, and corporations to use the power of
compound interest to double charity around the world. This initiative was launched in Bali at an
international conference co-chaired by Walter Cronkite and Bishop Desmond Tutu.
Beard has also been instrumental with the U.S. Social Security program and he authored a
book on the topic: Restoring Hope In America - The Social Security Solution (ICS Press 1995).
In 1994, Beard founded and became President of Economic Security, with leadership from U.S.
Senators Alan Simpson, Rick Santorum, Bob Kerrey and Pat Moynihan. Further, he worked with
the Clinton Administration and was then appointed to serve on President George W. Bush's
Social Security Commission.
Specialties: public service, corporate social responsibility, economic development, government
reform, community building, youth volunteerism, global investment
Prior Experience:
Founder and Chairman, National Development Council
Founder, The Jefferson Awards
Founder, Global Investment Foundation for Tomorrow
Social Security Commission

2. Education:
Yale University
M.A. History Columbia University
Links:
See: www.sambeard.org
See: www.network-democracy.org/social-security/nd/rt/beard.html
See: www.network-democracy.org/social-security/nd/rt/beard_paper.html
See: www.Amazon.CA:SamBeard:Books
See: www.globalinvestmentfoundation.org