Diahann Billings-Burford

 

Diahann Billings-Burford recently joined the Time Warner Inc. family as Executive Director, Cultural Investments.  In this newly created role, Diahann serves as a senior member of the Cultural Investments management team and has have primary responsibility for the strategic direction philanthropy and the programs and resources we provide to stimulate and support employee community engagement, and our community investments in New York City.  She also manages the grant making and operations of the Time Warner Foundation.

 

For five years as Chief Service Officer for the City of New York, Diahann headed NYC Service, a division of the Mayor’s Office with the mission of tapping the power of the people to meet pressing challenges.  NYC Service met the Mayor’s State of the City pledge for New York City to lead the way in answering President Obama’s nationwide call to service. The NYC Service program had three main goals: help more New Yorkers connect to service opportunities more easily, target volunteers to address the city’s greatest needs, and promote service as a core part of what it means to be a citizen in the greatest City in the world. NYC Service implemented 25 initiatives to meet these goals.  NYC Service initiatives targeted six impact areas: strengthening communities, helping neighbors in need, education, environment, health, and emergency preparedness.  Since its inception in April of 2009, NYC Service had engaged over 1.3 million New Yorkers in a wide range of volunteer activities, from beautifying neighborhood blocks, to providing tax assistance to low-income families, to volunteering to teach fitness classes at City recreation centers, to coating rooftops with reflective white paint to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

 

Prior to this appointment, Diahann served as Deputy Executive Director of External Affairs for City Year New York, a nonprofit organization.  In that position, Diahann established and maintained relationships with politicians, community leaders and stakeholders and oversaw recruitment and communications. 

 

Diahann is a very proud Brooklyn native and currently lives there with her husband and their two children.  She serves as a board member for buildOn .