Former White House Aide Suzanna Valdez Sets Sights On Miamis Growth As Executive At Knight Foundation

A private foundation that seeks to help build stronger communities in 26 cities and towns where its founders ran newspapers, foster excellence in journalism and promote press freedom is based in Miami.

It is the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, which June 1 appointed as program director a person with more than 16 years’ experience in management and public relations in the legislative, government, academic and private sectors.

Suzanna Valdez began her public-service career in Washington, serving in the office of the congressman from her hometown. She went on to work with Sen. Al Gore and then President Bill Clinton at the White House and in 1997 as deputy chief of staff at the US Department of Labor. In 2001, she was named associate director of the Eugene M. Lang Center for Entrepreneurship at Colombia University Business School.

Before taking her new role at the Knight Foundation in downtown Miami, Ms. Valdez was executive director in New York of the Nielsen Media Research’s Task Force on Television Measurement.

She was interviewed by Miami Today international editor Michael Hayes. This is an excerpt from the weekly profile article published in Miami Today. To read the entire article in full, order this issue or subscribe to the print edition of Miami Today. Advertisement