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Brandi Richard Thompson

Brandi Richard Thompson
Office of the Administrator

Director, DHS Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships (Acting)

Brandi Richard Thompson now serves as Interim Director of the DHS Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. She most recently served as Senior Advisor to the FEMA External Affairs Director and Communications Division Director, Interim External Affairs Director for FEMA Region 6, Public Affairs Officer and spokeswoman for FEMA Region 9, and the co-lead of the FEMA Diversity Management Advisory Council. She is the chair of the San Francisco Bay Area Federal Executive Board Public Affairs Council.

She began her FEMA career as a Hurricane Katrina contract call center agent (GS-5) in the TXNPSC and has been a Caseworker, Reports Analyst, Program Analyst, Emergency Management Specialist, Strategic Communications Lead, White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships Communication Detailee, New Public Assistance Delivery Model Communication Workstream Lead, and Public Assistance Outreach and Education Coordinator, and Office of Professional Responsibility Detailee in Denton, the District of Columbia, and now Oakland for the last 16 years. During her career, she has worked on every disaster type from wildfire to volcanic eruption.

Her government career also includes the Census Bureau, Social Security Administration (SSA), and two AmeriCorps tours. Prior to FEMA, Brandi was a Southwestern Bell Internet Services Webhosting Analyst Tier 2 (now AT&T), Marketing Administrator for the Annuity Board of the Southern Baptist Convention (now Guidestone), Executive Secretary for Henderson International Technologies and Sulzer Burckhardt Industrial Gas, Proposal Designer for PricewaterhouseCoopers, and an intern at Temerlin McClain Advertising Agency (now TM).

Brandi is a graduate of Texas Woman’s University in Business, Computer Science and English and a student of the Georgetown School of Continuing Studies in Social Media Management and Digital Marketing. She is also a graduate of the Aspen Institute on Racial Equity Leadership Development Program, the Vote Run Lead White House Project Ploughshares Fellowship, Leadership Dallas 2011, the Give1 Global Leadership Project in Morocco, and the MMS International Coaching Federation Certification program. Brandi has served as Dallas President, Southern Region Vice President and two terms as National President and Board Trustee for the Urban League’s Young Professionals, reaching over 2.5 million young professional leaders aged 21-40 to work over 200,000 service hours and raise over $2.9 million.

Brandi was named by the Dallas Morning News Guide as one of 5 Designers to Watch and was recognized as a top Black Woman in Media in New York. She was also recognized as a Dallas Business Journal Top 40 under 40 and with the 2011 Dallas Black Chamber of Commerce Community Service Lifetime Achievement Award. She holds a key to the city of Birmingham for her civil rights work among other honors. She is the daughter of retired SSA Area Director, Michael Richard and retired SSA Program Analyst, Sabra Richard, wife of Kerwin and proud mother of biomedical engineer, Brandice.