Rick Stafford, Longtime Friend of JHF, Retires from Academia

On Wednesday, October 30th, Carnegie Mellon University’s Heinz College honored Distinguished Service Professor Rick Stafford as he officially retires from academia. But Stafford isn’t retiring from community leadership as he assumes a volunteer role with JHF. Self-described as a simple boy from Greene County and a potato farmer from Somerset, it would be hard to enumerate all the contributions Stafford has made to the Pittsburgh region and across Pennsylvania. As the (youngest ever) Chief of Staff for Governor Dick Thornburgh, Stafford had to guide the Governor’s team through 3 Mile Island, the worst nuclear disaster in American history. As CEO of the Allegheny Conference, he helped make possible the revision of Allegheny County’s form of governance, the construction of two stadiums and one convention center, the Regional Asset district and more. As the head of Traffic21 and Metro21, Stafford helped realize a new era in intelligent, tech-enabled transit.