TBUSA Team

Cynthia Robbins is a lawyer and consultant who co-leads the Racial Justice Initiative of TimeBanks USA (RJI or the Initiative).  She co-founded RJI along with TimeBanks founder Dr. Edgar Cahn. The Initiative, formally launched in 2009, is charged with helping to dismantle structural racism in public systems such as the juvenile delinquency, public education, particularly special education and child welfare systems. For too long, government officials have evaded culpability for chronic and severe racial disparities and social injury resulting from violations of the Constitution and federal law. The Initiative team is developing a policy change and advocacy strategy designed to ignite communities of traditional disadvantage to demand that government officials use knowledge of what works to co-produce brighter futures filled with opportunity.  Along with Dr. Cahn, Cynthia Robbins co authored: An Offer They Can’t Refuse: Racial Disparity in Juvenile Justice and Deliberate Indifference Meet Alternatives That Work, 13 UDC/DCSL L Rev. 1 (2010) and “Public Notice Forums”Choosing Among Alternatives to Confront the Intent Requirements,  Clearinghouse Review (Jul-Aug 2010, Volume 44, No. 3-4)

In June 2010, the Racial Justice Initiative spearheaded a public hearing process in the Pennsylvania State Capitol, with an aggregate of more than twelve hours of hearing testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee and the House Committee on Children and Families. Witnesses shared data about the injury and costs of over-reliance on incarceration, offered descriptions of effective alternatives, and provided poignant first-party accounts of successful alternatives to incarceration and the painful price of failing to expand reliance on these more effective and less expensive alternatives.

Prior to becoming a full-time consultant again in the fall of 2008, Robbins served as Executive Director of See Forever Foundation (SFF) and Maya Angelou Public Charter School (MAPCS). First as managing and then executive director, she led with a committed focus on the SFF/MAPCS mission of creating learning communities that provide low income, urban students, particularly those who have not succeeded in traditional schools, a viable chance to reach their potential. The school boasted graduation and college enrollment rates of close to 80% during her tenure.  Cynthia guided See Forever and Maya Angelou through a period of substantial growth. In less than four and half years, SFF/MAPCS grew from one high school for about ninety (90) students to five campuses serving 600 students in fall 2008. In addition, to opening a second high school, the program focus also expanded by establishing a middle school and two campuses serving young people in the delinquency system, one at the youth facility for secure confinement, then Oak Hill–now Maya Angelou Academy, and the other at a Transition Center for youth upon release.

Robbins has experience as a civil rights and criminal defense attorney, adjunct professor of juvenile law, and a leader of philanthropic and operating foundations dedicated to advocacy, education, leadership support and organizational development. Robbins earned her BA cum laude from Harvard University and a JD from Stanford Law School.

She is currently an active board member of the Phelps Stokes Fund, the People’s Congregational Church Council and Scholarship Committee, the historic Lincoln Theatre on U Street, and formerly served as Chair of the Board of the DC Public Defender Service and Vice-Chair of the board of DC Vote, an organization seeking voting representation in Congress for DC residents.

Dr. Edgar S. Cahn is the creator of Time Dollars and the founder of TimeBanks USA, as well as the co-founder of the National Legal Services Program and the Antioch School of Law (now the David A. Clarke School of Law). He is the author of “No More Throw Away People: The Co-Production Imperative,” “Time Dollars” (co-author Jonathan Rowe, Rodale Press, 1992), “Our Brother’s Keeper: The Indian in White America,” (1972) and “Hunger USA.” The development of Time Dollars is just one achievement in a career that, since the early 1960′s, has been dedicated to achieving social justice for the disenfranchised. His own life is an example of dedication to strongly held principles and ideals, and he brings to audiences a powerful vision, sincere compassion, spontaneous humor, and the ability to inspire others.
Edgar Cahn is the originator of Time Dollars, the creator of the Co-Production principle, and the President and Founder of the Time Dollar USA. A compelling speaker, Edgar possesses the eloquence, passion, and sense of humor to inspire in his audiences a sense not only that social justice matters, but that it calls for immediate action. For over four decades, his own life has stood as a model for action and as a testament to his abiding concern for the rights, welfare, and dignity of the disenfranchised.

A graduate of the Yale law school, Edgar entered the legal profession determined to use the law to achieve social justice. He started his career in government as special counsel and speechwriter for Attorney General Robert Kennedy under President John Kennedy. As part of that role, he was assigned by Kennedy to the Solicitor General’s office for the government’s amicus brief in civil rights sit-in cases. Edgar also worked to spearhead the first national campaign against hunger and malnutrition in the US, and in doing so, he authored an influential report entitled Hunger USA, which led to legislation enforcing shipments of food to severely malnourished communities on Indian reservations and in the southern United States. His work to fight hunger also involved initiating the earliest litigation to challenge the administration of the food stamp and commodities program, establishing the standing for potential recipients, and assisting in the preparation and defense of controversial documentary, “Hunger in America.”

In 1963, Edgar’s life and work seeking social justice first became known at a larger scale when the article he co-authored with his late wife, Jean Camper Cahn, titled “The War on Poverty: A Civilian Perspective” was published in the Yale Law Journal and became the blueprint for the National Legal Services program. Using their model and working closely with Sargent Shriver and the War on Poverty, Edgar and Jean co-created the National Legal Services program under the Office of Economic Opportunity in the Johnson administration.
Having left the government for work with the Field Foundation in 1968, Edgar founded the Citizens Advocate Center as watchdog on government whose primary purpose was to challenge the colonialism of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. That same year, he authored “Our Brother’s Keeper, the Indian in White America.” Leading American Indian activists did the research for the book, which was intended as a catalyst for change in national policy and which helped to spearhead the official adoption of Indian self-determination as national policy.

In 1972, Edgar and his late wife created and founded the Antioch School of Law, which later became the UDC David A. Clarke School of Law and continues the tradition established in the Antioch days to emphasize social justice as a critical role for the law. As law-school deans, Edgar and Jean were the first pioneers of clinical legal education in the US, an approach which is now to be found in law schools throughout the nation.

In 1980 after a massive heart attack that nearly claimed his life, Cahn stepped outside of the law to create yet another social invention, a local, tax-exempt currency called Time Dollars, which are designed to validate and reward the work of the disenfranchised in rebuilding their communities and fighting for social justice. As a distinguished fellow at the London School of Economics, Edgar completed the work on Time Dollars that has led to Time Dollar initiatives being funded by government and major philanthropic foundations in the United States in areas as widespread as juvenile justice, community health, education, public housing, community building, wraparound services for children with emotional disorders, immigrant workers’ rights, and elder care.

As the president and founder of the Time Dollar USA, Cahn’s experience with Time Dollars led him in 1995 to develop a radical new framework for social welfare and social justice that turns recipients of service into co-producers of change. He called this new approach “Co-Production.” An example of Co-Production principles at work can be seen in Washington, DC, his home city, where in 1996 he founded the Time Dollar Youth Court, whose mission is to enlist youth in changing the shape of juvenile justice in DC. Sanctioned by the DC Superior Court, the Time Dollar Youth Court is now among the largest youth courts in the nation. Its innovative design enlists more than 400 youth each year, the majority of them former delinquents, as active shapers of a new form of justice for DC youth.

Besides creating the National Legal Services program, pioneering clinical legal education, and enjoying a long and distinguished career as an advocate for the nation’s disenfranchised, Edgar has held positions at the University of Miami School of Law, Florida International University, the London School of Economics, Center for the Study of Human Rights, Columbia University and the UDC David A. Clarke School of Law.

Cahn’s educational background includes a B.A. magna cum laude from Swarthmore College, an M.A. and Ph.D. from Yale University, and a J.D. from Yale Law School. Honors include: Phi Beta Kappa, Magna Cum Laude, Fulbright Scholar (Cambridge University), Order of the Coif, Articles & Book Review Editor, Yale Law Journal; Jefferson Award for Outstanding Public Service Benefiting Local Communities; Founder’s Award, National Council on Aging; American Association of Law Schools William Pincus Award for Outstanding Contribution to Clinical Legal Education; Point of Light 1997; Co-op Quarterly 1998 Building Economic Alternatives Award for Outstanding Work in Fostering a Sustainable Economy; Medal of Distinction, D.C. Superior Court 2000.

Lisa Conlan is a national family leader in the field of children’s mental health and has worked with families, communities and states for over the last 20 years. Ms. Conlan has worked extensively with family run 501c 3 nonprofit organizations to develop sound business infrastructures and programs. Ms. Conlan served as the Executive Director of the Parent Support Network of Rhode Island and she worked for the National Federation of Families for Children’s Mental Health for over seven years. Ms. Conlan has provided extensive technical assistance in the area of system building across all system of care components and is a national co-trainer for Primer Hands On, Skill Building in Strategy for System of Care Leaders. Ms. Conlan continues to share her experiences across the country in the areas of strategic planning, program development, family and community organizing, state and community partnerships, conflict resolution, contract development, public policy and advocacy. Currently Ms. Conlan is the Executive Director of the RI TimeBanks and sits on sits of the Board of Directors of TimeBanks USA.

Merlyn Kettering, a Senior Associate with TimeBanks USA, brings over three decades of international development experience in over 30 nations to the TBUSA Network. He has contributed to development theory and practice through innovations such as action-training, team planning methodology, project financial management, participatory agricultural research, action research, information technology and peacemaking. His work for TBUSA focuses on organizational development, leadership, training and consultation for TimeBanks and CareBanks, and writing for the TimeBank Guidebook Series, TimeBanking: The Wealth of Possibilities, including two published self-study guides: Guidebook 1: Exploring the Big Ideas of TimeBanking; and Guidebook 2, Vision a TimeBank for Your Community; and another now being written, Guidebook 3: Planning and Starting a TimeBank.

Coming soon!

Coordinator, Dane County Time Bank. Co-owner of Mother Fool’s Coffeehouse, which she and her husband have run for over 11 years. She received media and strategy training during her six-plus years with the international environmental organization Greenpeace (1989 – 1995), having served as local office director of the Madison office for two of those years. In 1995 she helped to form Madison Hours local currency and continues to volunteer with the program. From 2000 to 2004 she served on the steering committee of the local independent political party Progressive Dane, serving as party co-chair from 2002 – 2004.