Richard F. Callahan
Associate Dean and Director of State Capital and Leadership Programs
USC State Capital Center
1800 I Street
Sacramento, CA 95833
Email: rcallaha@usc.edu
Ph.D. in Public Administration
University of Southern California
Current research includes networks and state agencies, leadership training practices, leadership in information technology for executives in state government, and the political design of public agencies. He has been published in the Public Administration Review, American Review of Public Administration, and Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory. He received the Editor’s Choice award for outstanding contributions in 2005 for his service on the editorial board of the academic journal: Public Administration Review.
Since 1998, he has directed the delivery of graduate degree programs in Sacramento, with 35 classes annually, as well as directing in the past year, six leadership training programs, designed and presented by USC, for: state government executives: newly elected local officials and staff; regional government; nonprofit and county health executives; county mental health executives; and legislative staff from across the United States.
In the past year he has worked with over 600 executives in leadership programs. He also teaches practices and applied theory in working with the private and public sectors for graduate students in the master degree programs of health, planning, public administration, and public policy.
Dr. Callahan serves on the Editorial Board of Public Administration Review, Board of Directors of Sacramento Healthcare Decisions; the American Congress of Health Care Executives, Sacramento Regent’s Advisory Board; and the Executive Council of the Sacramento Chapter of the American Society of Public Administration.
Previously, he has over 12 years of local government and county government experience, including 5 years as a township administrator for a $35 million annual operating budget. He has designed and implemented a range of new local government programs.
He has a BA degree, with honors in political theory, from Georgetown University and attended Tenri University, Japan. He has a master degree and a doctorate in public administration from USC.
Funded current research projects:
Bedrosian Center on Governance: Public-Private Partnership Performance of the Alameda Corridor
IBM Center on the Business of Government: Network Formation in Homeland Security
Additional past projects include:
Leadership training for the executives in the California State Department of Managed Health Care.
Served on the Strategic Facilities Committee for the California Department of Motor Vehicles.
Serving on a team advising the newly elected governor’s cabinet appointees for the state of Aguascalientes, Mexico.
Teaching strategy models for the California State Information Technology Leadership Academy, California Department of Social Services, California Department of Health Services, and the Peace Officers Standards and Training Department.
Chaired a panel for the national Conference of Government Ethics Laws.
Chaired a panel on public agency reform for the state-wide Envisioning California Conference.
Presented on a finance and governance panel to the Institute for Local Government.
Taught a graduate course in public administration at the Universidad Anahauc de Xalapa, Mexico.