Jonathan M. Rewers, AICP · San Francisco
Jonathan Rewers
I have worked in, for, and with cities for three decades.
Planner. Designer. Chief financial officer. Chief strategy officer. Teacher. Now I chair the Institute for Civic Service, working on the craft of civic service itself: how public institutions earn trust by getting things built.
2024 Eisenhower Fellow · Chief Strategy Officer, SFMTA · Chair & Principal Advisor of Practice, Institute for Civic Service · Director of Mobility, North America, Cities Today Institute
- 25Years serving cities
- $2B+Competitive funding secured
- 100+Graduate candidates taught at Parsons
- 20+Capital projects in Sacramento alone
About
A budget is a moral document.
For three decades Jonathan Rewers has worked in, for, and with cities: as a planner, a designer, a chief financial officer, a chief strategy officer, and a teacher. He has run a transit agency's strategy division and its finances through a pandemic, rebuilt capital programs from paper into systems, secured more than $2 billion in competitive funding, written a new federal surface transportation act from scratch, and taught the design method behind the work to graduate students at Parsons School of Design.
At the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency he served as the agency's first Chief Strategy Officer and, before that, its Chief Financial Officer, stewarding the finances through the pandemic crisis, structuring over $1B in emergency federal relief, and restoring service without layoffs. Earlier he implemented the 2016 Project Delivery Framework, created the agency's first Project Management Office, and ran the Building Progress facilities and joint development program.
In Sacramento he wrote the city's first Sustainability Master Plan and rebuilt Fort Natomas in six months. At Parsons he taught strategic design and new economies. As a 2024 Eisenhower Fellow he researched mega-city mobility across six Chinese cities. He now chairs the Institute for Civic Service, where the work is the craft itself: the values, methods, and judgment that let public institutions deliver.
Public service is not just a career. It is a calling.
Selected Work
Eighteen studies. Every one opens into the work itself, what it teaches, and the documents behind it.
The FRAME Act
A complete federal Surface Transportation Act, written from scratch with the practitioners who run the system.
The Lost Art of the Plan
The Institute's book on the planning profession's lost soul, and the method for winning it back.
National Transit Adaptation Strategy
The Federal Transit Administration research program on how transit adapts after a shock, run with MIT, the Institute for the Future, IDEO, and partners.
Why I started ICS
Most of that knowledge lives only in the people who did the work. When they leave, it leaves with them. I did not want a career of practice to end with the person who lived it.
So I started the Institute for Civic Service to build a vessel for what I know: a place where that practice can be written down, taught, and handed on. The FRAME Act, written from scratch, and The Lost Art of the Plan, the Institute's book, are part of that: work held by an institution, not by one man.
People internalize a mission from a story, not a style guide. The Institute exists to tell that story plainly and to keep the craft alive in the people who come next, because public service is not just a career. It is a calling.
Resume
Education and Credentials
- MS, Strategic Design and Management, Parsons School of Design, The New School, 2015
- MA, Urban and Regional Planning, San José State University, 2012
- BA, English, History and Political Science, University of California, Davis, 2001
- Certified Planner (AICP), American Institute of Certified Planners, 2012
Roles
- Chair & Principal Advisor of Practice, Institute for Civic Service
- Director of Mobility, North America, Cities Today Institute
- Chief Strategy Officer, San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, the agency's first
- Chief Financial Officer, San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency
- Graduate Faculty, Parsons School of Design, The New School
- Sustainability Program Manager, City of Sacramento
Parsons taught him design. He taught it back.
Jonathan Rewers earned his MS in Strategic Design and Management at Parsons School of Design in 2015; his thesis research on administrative agility led directly to an appointment to the graduate faculty in 2016. For five years he taught the method to more than a hundred graduate candidates, while running capital programs by day.
Courses taught
- Managing Creative Projects & Teams: course lead; rebuilt the curriculum in 2018 around human-centered project architecture and agile team dynamics
- Strategic Design in New Economies: macroeconomic transformation, platform ecosystems, civic technology
- Sustainable Business Models: circular economy, regenerative business architecture, triple-bottom-line modeling
- Integrative Studios I to III: studio master, with NASA (Low-Earth Orbit economy), healthcare innovation (Parkinson's disease), and Italia Innovation
The New Economies lectures
His master lecture, 288 slides, Fall 2019, runs the full arc: foundations and the Fourth Industrial Revolution, markets from mercantilism to capitalism, Doughnut Economics, behavioral economics, systems and feedback loops, resiliency and thresholds, the ten schools of strategy, strategic design, the circular economy, and algorithmic culture, closing with Discovery and Design Intelligence.
In development: a book drawn from the lectures, written in the voice that taught them.
Guest lectures and masterclasses
- Stanford GSB: "Transport | Innovation," POLECON 531, May 2024
- UC Berkeley CED: structuring the Potrero Yard P3, December 2022
- Tianjin University: digital city design and decarbonization, June 2024
- University of Hong Kong: electric fleet telematics colloquium, June 2024
- Tongji University: cross-Pacific infrastructure frameworks, July 2024
Research
- National Transit Adaptation Strategy: executive sponsor; FTA research program with MIT, the Institute for the Future, IDEO, and other partners
- MIT Transit Research Consortium: founding institutional member; machine-learning mobility analysis
- Parsons and NASA: economic and governance frameworks for Low-Earth Orbit commercialization
Writing
- Institute book, in revision
The Lost Art of the Plan
The Institute for Civic Service's book on the planning profession's lost soul, and the method for winning it back. Seeing the city whole.
- 2025
The FRAME Act
A complete federal Surface Transportation Act, written from scratch with the practitioners who run the system. Launched December 18, 2025.
- NTAS capstone
Building a Future-Ready Public Transportation System
The NTAS capstone as named in the February 2026 resume; the title is not settled against the portfolio record and no file is staged.
Listed for the record. Not yet published on this site.
- 2024
The Quiet Crisis
Systemic trust, administrative agility, and the imperative for action in public institutions. "Society needs things to be done, not just arguments won."
- 2018
Hackable Cities
A design-led method for tactical public space interventions and civic action. Parsons School of Design, School of Design Strategies.
- Prototype, 2023, revised 2026
The Design Book
His design book prototype: 60 pages in its 2023 form, revised July 2026.
- Prototype
Strategy & Markets
A book prototype on strategy and markets, from his Parsons strategy teaching and the New Economies lectures.
- Book 2, prototype, designed edition
Strategy & Systems Thinking
The companion strategy book: systems thinking as a leadership discipline.
- Prototype, designed edition
The Second Loop
How leaders break vicious circles and build resilience.
- 2018
Managing Creative Projects and Teams: A Pedagogical Framework for Agile Design Execution
Parsons, 2018. Listed in the resume record's publications; the framework behind the graduate course he led, rebuilt that year around human-centered project architecture and agile team dynamics.
Listed for the record. Not yet published on this site.
- 2012
A Plan for Planning
His master's project at San José State, the seed of everything since: what planners are for.
- 2007
Creating a Sustainable City
Sacramento's first Sustainability Master Plan, a master plan to move a capital city toward sustainability.
The Institute for Civic Service
The Institute's work: the FRAME Act, The Lost Art of the Plan, and the craft of civic service itself, written down, taught, and handed on.
Jonathan Rewers serves as its Chair & Principal Advisor of Practice.
incivicservice.org