On The Boards

The Philadelphia Inquirer

March 17, 2008

A Better Philadelphia, a nonprofit organization with a mission to end youth violence across the region, elected the following officers and members:

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People On The Move

Philadelphia Business Journal
A Better Philadelphia, with a mission to end youth violence in the Delaware Valley, has elected nine new board members.

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Phil Goldsmith | PUBLIC SERVANTS WHO DESERVE OUR THANKS

TOMORROW is my favorite day of the year, even though my wife and I will be bone-tired by early evening. We will have entertained 28 family members for dinner: sisters, daughters, brothers-in law, sons-in-law, nieces, nephews, grandchildren and whoever else tags along.

As I grow older I realize how much more I have to be thankful for. I start with the fact that both sets of my grandparents emigrated to the United States from Russia. I wonder how different my life would be if I had grown up there.

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Local Woman Running Marathon to Raise Funds for 'A Better Philadelphia'
Work and Life Converge for President and CEO of New Non-Profit Developed to Improve Philadelphia

GLENSIDE, Pa. (March 6, 2006) – She may not be a “runner,” but Mary K. O’Brien is in a race, literally and figuratively.

Glenside resident and mother of two, Mary O’Brien is running the national MORE Magazine marathon for Women Over 40 in New York City on Sunday, March 26. It is her first marathon, and she may not win the race, but she’s not in it for the glory. She is in it for Philly—to help the city’s youth live up to their potential. In this marathon, every mile she runs represents that much more money raised to benefit the city of brotherly love. And if you ask Mary, what this city needs is more brotherly love. She just happens to be the president and CEO of an organization geared to doing just that.

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Mary O'Brien
Working for a World Without Violence

(2003)

Mary O'Brien doesn't want to open a shelter for battered women. She doesn't want to staff a hotline or offer counseling. She doesn't want to help newly-independent women find jobs or daycare or a lawyer. It's not that she doesn't care about domestic violence or its victims. She simply wants to go deeper — beyond domestic violence itself to the cultures that perpetuate and condone violence against women, and the uncoordinated systems that address it.

"Of course direct services are important, but improving the system that victims have to deal with — the hospitals, the police, the courts — that's important too," she says. "Current systems are primarily designed to respond to assault and abuse after they have occurred — they're not designed to prevent it or eradicate it."

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