Libby Schaaf is the president and CEO of the Bay Area Council. Previously, she served as Oakland’s 50th mayor from 2015 to 2023, following a term as a member of the Oakland City Council. A native Oaklander, Schaaf has two decades of public service experience that began while she was a young attorney leading volunteer efforts in Oakland. She later left her legal career at Oakland’s largest law firm to build and run the first centralized volunteer program for Oakland public schools at the Marcus Foster Institute. Schaaf eventually went on to become Public Affairs Director for the Port of Oakland and chief of staff and top mayoral aide to Jerry Brown. In 2016, Schaaf launched The Oakland Promise, a cradle-to-career initiative that aims to triple the number of college graduates from Oakland within the next decade.
