Katie Hong to Join Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation – Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Marianne Bichsel
Mayor’s Office
Phone: 206.684.8878

SEATTLE — Katie Hong, director of the City of Seattle’s Office of Housing, is joining the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to become deputy director of its Pacific Northwest giving program, which focuses on vulnerable children and families.

Reporting to Greg Shaw, the foundation’s PNW program director, Hong will be responsible for day-to-day management of the foundation’s grant making in the Pacific Northwest as well as strategic development and implementation of programs and new initiatives.

“Katie brings a solid career in public service to a team of experienced program officers who partner with nonprofits throughout our region in each of our program’s grant areas, including community grants, community access to technology grants and the Sound Families Initiative,” Shaw said. “Katie’s considerable experience in government, housing and community development will benefit our many grantees in the region.”

Hong said, “As I’ve seen through my experience with the Sound Families Initiative, the Gates Foundation can play a critical role in bringing diverse parties together to improve the lives of vulnerable children and families. I’m excited to join the foundation and to play a role in helping to make positive change in our community.”

Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels said, “Katie is an outstanding public servant. I know Katie will bring energy, innovative ideas and extraordinary talent to her new position with the foundation. Katie has shown time and again that she knows how to get things done and really make a difference for people.”

Sound Families is the foundation’s $40 million effort to increase transitional housing for homeless families with children in Washington state. The city’s Office of Housing serves as the administrative partner for Sound Families, and Hong is co-chair of the Sound Families Steering Committee.

Prior to her two-year Office of Housing tenure, Hong was Nickels’ senior policy adviser on housing, economic development and neighborhoods. Previously, Hong was a White House Fellow, working in the White House Chief of Staff’s Office. Hong also spent time as an executive policy adviser to Gov. Gary Locke and a program examiner in the Office of Management and Budget in Washington D.C.

Hong holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of California at Berkeley and a master’s in public policy from the University of Chicago. Hong is active in the community, serving as an adjunct professor at Seattle University’s Institute of Public Service and as a board member of the Asian Community Leadership Foundation. She’s a 1999 graduate of Leadership Tomorrow.

Hong is scheduled to start at the foundation in late September