Please join us in celebrating this year’s honorees for their extraordinary public service—an embodiment of the values championed by Elliot Richardson. A beacon of integrity and principled leadership, Richardson was a Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration and served in four Cabinet-level roles, including Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare; Secretary of Defense; Attorney General; and Secretary of Commerce.
The Richardson Prize recognizes individuals who exemplify the public service virtues Richardson personified. Awardees are selected for their outstanding achievements, their significant contributions to the public good, and their enduring dedication to serving the public interest. As stated in the Prize’s bylaws, recipients must demonstrate “generosity of spirit, thoughtfulness in the pursuit of excellence in government, courage, and integrity.”
Many past Prize recipients are Fellows or Honorary Fellows of the Academy. This distinguished group includes Colin Powell, Alice Rivlin, George Shultz, Norman Mineta, Sandra Day O’Connor, Lee Hamilton, Tom Kean, James Baker, George Mitchell, Robert Gates, Sheila Colleen Bair, Paul Volcker Jr., John Koskinen, William D. Ruckelshaus, Sylvia Mathews Burwell, Leon Panetta, Edmund G. Brown Jr., Dr. Francis Collins, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Admiral Thad Allen, and Governor David Beasley.
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Janet L. Yellen served as 78th Secretary of the Treasury from 2021 through 2025. She is currently a Distinguished Fellow in Residence at the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy at the Brookings Institution. She also served as Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System from 2014 through February 2018, Vice Chair of the Board of Governors from 2010 to 2014 and president and chief executive officer of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco from 2004 to 2010.
Dr. Yellen previously served as a member of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System from August 1994 through February 1997, whereupon she was appointed by President Bill Clinton to serve as chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, a post she held until August 1999.
Dr. Yellen began her career as an assistant professor at Harvard University and then served as an economist with the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors before joining the faculty of the London School of Economics in 1978. In 1980 she joined the faculty of the University of California at Berkeley, where she was named the Eugene E. and Catherine M. Trefethen Professor of Business and Professor of Economics, and where she is currently a professor emeritus.
Dr. Yellen graduated from Brown University in 1967 and received her PhD in economics from Yale University in 1971. She has received numerous honorary degrees, is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and has served as President of the American Economic Association and the Western Economic Association.
As Governor of Washington State (the first Chinese American to be elected governor in United States history and the first Asian American governor on the mainland), U.S. Secretary of Commerce, and U.S. Ambassador to China, Gary Locke has been a leader in the areas of education, employment, trade, health care, human rights, and the environment.
As Washington’s 21st Governor from 1997-2005, the nation’s most trade dependent state, Mr. Locke increased exports of Washington State products and services by leading trade missions to Mexico, Europe, and Asia, more than doubling the state’s exports to China.
During his tenure, he achieved bipartisan welfare reform and oversaw the gain of 280,000 private sector jobs, despite two national recessions. Mr. Locke also had the most diverse cabinet in state history. More than half his judicial appointments were women and 25% were people of color.
As U.S. Secretary of Commerce from 2009-2011, he led President Obama's National Export Initiative to double American exports in five years; assumed a troubled 2010 Census process but which under his active supervision produced the most accurate Census in U.S. history and ended on time and 25% under budget, saving taxpayers $2 billion; and achieved the most significant reduction in patent application processing in the agency's history: from 40 months down to one year. With U.S. Secretary of Defense Bob Gates, Mr. Locke also oversaw a significant first step in the president’s export control reform effort that strengthened national security, while making U.S. companies more competitive by easing their licensing burden for high-tech exports.
As U.S. Ambassador to China from 2011-2014, he opened markets for made-in-USA goods and services; promoted Chinese investment into the U.S.; reduced wait times for visa interviews of Chinese applicants from 100 days to 3 days; and through the Embassy's air quality monitoring program, exposed the severity of the air pollution in China, causing the Chinese people to demand action by their government and their government in turn beginning to address the issue.
His innovations in government efficiency, customer focus, and priority-based budgeting, as well as successful and under-budget management of high-risk initiatives, have won him acclaim from nationally recognized authors and organizations, including Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. In his two-terms as Governor, Washington was ranked one of America’s four best-managed states.
He most recently served as Interim President of Bellevue College, the Washington State’s largest open access institution of higher education.
Mr. Locke is the Chairman of Locke Global Strategies, advising domestic and international clients in several areas, including trade, regulatory, and investment issues.
Mr. Locke began his career in public service in the Washington State House of Representatives, serving from 1983-1994. He was then elected King County Executive, serving from 1994-1997.
An award-winning journalist and podcast host, Jenn White has worked in public radio since 1999. She joined WAMU and NPR’s national talk show 1A in 2020. 1A is heard on more than 430 stations nationwide and reaches an audience of almost 4 million listeners each week. It is heard on stations in NYC, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, Washington DC, Philadelphia, Boston, and Minneapolis/St. Paul among many others. The 1A Podcast is downloaded more than 1 million times each month and is part of the NPR Podcast Network.
Jenn joined 1A from Chicago’s WBEZ where she hosted the station’s local two-hour midday show, Reset with Jenn White. She is also a familiar voice on several WBEZ podcasts, including Making Oprah, Making Obama and 16 Shots, which chronicled the fatal police shooting of Laquan McDonald and the trial of Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke. Before WBEZ, White was the local host of All Things Considered at Michigan Radio.
White is also a skilled public speaker and has moderated numerous on-air gubernatorial and mayoral debates. A native of Detroit and graduate of the University of Michigan, she now resides in Maryland with her husband.