mission
OUR Vision:
A nation comprised of thriving communities where residents have trust and confidence in each other and in their government’s ability to meet their collective needs and respond effectively and equitably to emerging challenges. Local governments can be a catalyst for innovation, opportunity and cross-sector collaboration. By empowering the workforce and making decisions based on data insights, meaningful engagement and smart fiscal policy, local leaders and their allies can create anti-fragile communities that get stronger as they face challenges and disruptions.
OUR TEAM:
We’re a team of seasoned practitioners, storytellers and conveners. Armed with decades of 360-degree experience in the inner workings of how policy is built, funded and enacted, we bring insights, capacity and collective impact to the work of local government.
our values:
We believe trust is the bond that allows people to come together in communities and govern themselves effectively.
We believe in the fundamental worth of all people. Every person should be treated with dignity and have a voice in their community.
We believe being smart with the money, managing financial resources well, is key to the performance of every other government function.
Mark Funkhouser
Julia Burrows
VERONIKA ZUBO
Pete Saunders
MEET THE TEAM
Mark Funkhouser, president of Funkhouser & Associates, is a municipal finance expert who has spent decades in government service. As the mayor of Kansas City, Missouri, during the Great Recession, Mark made the tough choices to put his city on the path to fiscal sustainability. That experience, his long tenure as an auditor and his most recent post as the publisher of Governing magazine have made him a trusted and credible advisor to government officials across the country. Mark also is the founder of the International Center for Performance Auditing (ICPA) and a founding member of the Association of Local Government Auditors (ALGA). He has dedicated much of his career, research and writing to advancing the public sector performance auditing profession and strengthening its real-world impact. Mark holds a master’s degree in social work from West Virginia University, an M.B.A. from Tennessee State University, and an interdisciplinary Ph.D. in public administration and urban sociology from the University of Missouri at Kansas City.
Julia Burrows
Julia Burrows is a consultant at Funkhouser & Associates, a local government practitioner and policy advisor with decades of experience in sustainability, housing, civic engagement, and economic development. Julia joined F&A after serving as Special Assistant to Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg advising on climate mitigation, COVID-19 response and homelessness. She previously served as Director of the Governing Institute and in various roles during her 22 years with the City of Roseville, CA including Deputy City Manager. Julia holds a B.S. from the University of California, Davis in Environmental Policy Analysis & Planning.
Veronika Zubo, a consultant at F&A, is an expert project manager and community engagement specialist focused on driving dialogue and innovation at the intersection of policy, business and society. She has over a decade of experience in developing programs and initiatives geared at innovation, performance improvement and coalition building in the public sector. Previously, she spearheaded strategic initiatives and multi-stakeholder projects at Governing and later at Foreign Policy magazine. She is passionate about supporting collective impact and good governance at the local level through cultivating peer learning, cross-sector partnerships and bringing strategic planning capacity to municipal organizations. Veronika holds an M.A. in political science from California State University Long Beach.
Pete Saunders is an urban planner specializing in planning, community development, economic development and community engagement, conducted within the public, private and non-profit sectors. Pete is the community and economic development director for the Village of Richton Park, IL, and principal for PDS Consulting, an urban planning consulting and research firm.
Pete is also a thought leader and subject matter expert whose writing and research focuses on the social forces that shape our cities – and developing policies to address them. Pete has been the editor/publisher of the Corner Side Yard, an urbanist blog, since 2012. In addition to blogging, Pete served as an urban affairs contributor to Bloomberg Opinion, Governing, and Forbes, from 2016-2022.
Anna Weiss is a Public Policy Research Associate Intern at Funkhouser & Associates whose interests include municipal finance and energy resilience policy. A native of the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton area in Pennsylvania, Anna moved to Chicago as a summer student at Ballet Chicago and later obtained her bachelor’s degree at Loyola University Chicago. She is currently a second-year master’s in public policy candidate at the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago. Before Harris, she worked at an outpatient addiction treatment center on the West Side of Chicago in data analysis, nonprofit administration, grants and fundraising.
Funkhouser & Associates was founded in 2019 by Mark Funkhouser on the idea that we can build a better government by building trusted relationships with each other and government partners.
OUR CLIENTS include
