Michael Jacobson is ISLG's founding Executive Director. During his decade-long tenure, Michael has grown ISLG from a team of five into a multidisciplinary team of more than 60 who work on projects spanning criminal legal reform, municipal budgeting, capacity-building for community-based organizations, and many others. Throughout this growth, Michael provides strategic guidance for key projects, facilitates partnerships across fields, and leads the overall direction of the organization. Holding a PhD in sociology, he is also a professor at the CUNY Graduate Center as well as sits on a number of advisory boards across New York City and the country.  

Michael has had an extensive academic career coupled with more than 20 years of government service, poising him as a leading voice in turning innovative state and local government policy into practice, especially in the criminal legal field. Prior to creating CUNY ISLG in 2013, Michael was president of the Vera Institute of Justice, serving from 2005 to 2013. From 1998 to 2005, he was a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and the CUNY Graduate Center. Before that, he was the New York City Correction Commissioner from 1995 to 1998, New York City Probation Commissioner from 1992 to 1996, and was a deputy budget director for New York City Office of Management and Budget from 1984 to 1992. In 2010 to 2012, Michael served as the chair of Altus, a global alliance working across continents and from a multicultural perspective to improve public safety and justice. He is also the author of Downsizing Prisons: How to Reduce Crime and End Mass Incarceration (New York University Press, 2005).