About The Sarbanes Center
Continuing A Legacy of Service
The Sarbanes Center is a nonprofit convener and project booster grounded in the belief that healthy, engaged communities are the foundation of a thriving democracy, and that collaborative solutions are essential to addressing the complex challenges of our time.
Through focused, project-based partnerships, the Sarbanes Center supports youth civic engagement, promotes physical and mental health, and advances environmental stewardship—three interconnected pillars that drive healthy communities and build a vibrant democratic society.
Rather than operating as a traditional foundation or think tank, the Center works directly with nonprofit partners to catalyze their projects for maximum impact. By providing strategic advising, partnership development, and access to networks and expertise, the Center helps organizations take those projects to the next level. With successful deployment, a project can serve as a best practices model for other nonprofits to follow and can also inform broader public policy solutions for lawmakers at the federal, state, and local levels.
Our critical asset is connectivity — knowing who and what can further the success of our partners and maximize their projects’ impact. To that end, we are in a constant mode of outreach — to foundations, other nonprofits and community leaders across all sectors — to identify deserving nonprofit partners who are executing innovative and impactful projects.
Our Values
Service
Service lies at the heart of the Sarbanes Center. The organization exists to support partners working on the front lines of civic life, providing expertise, connections, and strategic insight to help important initiatives succeed.
Collaboration
The most effective solutions emerge through partnership. The Center brings together nonprofits, community leaders, businesses, foundations, and public institutions to pursue shared goals and maximize impact.
Integrity & Trust
Strong partnerships depend on transparency, accountability, and respect. The Sarbanes Center is committed to building relationships grounded in integrity and mutual trust.
Practical Impact
The Center believes in the power of targeted action as a catalyst for change – connecting big ideas to lasting, real-world impact, through discreet project support that builds confidence and can be scaled to meet society’s greatest challenges.
Nonpartisan Engagement
The Sarbanes Center is proudly nonpartisan and works with organizations across sectors and perspectives to strengthen civic life and advance the public good.
Leadership
Drawing on years of accumulated experience at the intersection of the public, private and nonprofit sectors, the Sarbanes team is well-equipped to assist its project partners across a range of challenges and opportunities.
The Center benefits from the portfolio of important initiatives undertaken by Congressman Sarbanes during his tenure in elected office. Those initiatives help to inform the Center’s selection of projects and, in some cases, can be developed further into their own projects using the increased flexibility that a nonprofit hub offers.
While Congressman Sarbanes brings special experience working with government officials at the local, regional, and national level, his legislative initiatives in Congress also involved close collaboration with partners in the nonprofit and private sectors — community organizations, advocacy groups, foundations, businesses, and philanthropists. In addition, before coming to Congress, he spent nearly two decades representing small, medium, and large businesses, while serving in a volunteer capacity on a variety of nonprofit boards and working part-time with the State Superintendent of Schools.
A Special Connection
More than a century ago, Spyros and Matina Sarbanes immigrated from Greece to the United States in search of opportunity and a better life. Like many immigrant families, they carried with them a deep appreciation for community, hard work, and civic responsibility.
They instilled in their children the belief that contributing to society—through service, volunteerism, and engagement in public life—was both a privilege and a responsibility. That ethos of service continued through successive generations of the Sarbanes family.
Reflecting the Sarbanes family’s immigrant story and deep ties to Greece, the Center will also foster partnerships between U.S. nonprofits and civil society organizations in Greece.
This public diplomacy initiative—the Hellenic Bridge—strengthens cultural and civic connections while bringing insights from Greece’s democratic traditions and modern experience into contemporary civic work.
Meet Our Team
Our Staff
John Sarbanes
Kristen Weiss Fidler
Kelly Moura
Our Board
Alice Johnson Cain
