Walter Katz
Walter Katz joined Arnold Ventures after more than two decades in public service. That included a long tenure as a public defender in Southern California through his appointment as Deputy Chief of Staff for Public Safety in the administration of Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel. At the Mayor’s Office, Walter oversaw one of the most complex police reform efforts in the United States, served as a co-negotiator of the consent decree enacted in 2019, and led the design and development of the new Office of Violence Prevention.
Walter has an extensive background in law enforcement accountability and oversight. Prior to returning to his birthplace of Chicago, he served as the city council-appointed Independent Police Auditor for San Jose, California in 2015. Immediately before coming to Arnold Ventures, Walter was the Director of Professional Services at a start-up developer of early intervention systems and provided advice to jurisdictions around the U.S. seeking to align policy and technology with 21st century policing practices.
At Arnold Ventures, Walter leads grantmaking efforts in research and policy in community safety and policing that includes an emphasis on reducing community violence, gun policy research, strengthening police accountability, and improving the police response.
He has written about independent investigations of police lethal use of force in the Harvard Law Review Forum and his work has been featured in The New York Times, been commissioned for the Federal Reserve Banks, and appears across publications. Walter is a member of the Council on Criminal Justice and served on its Task Force on Policing. He currently serves on the board of trustees of Children’s Home and Aid in Chicago.