Taneshia Nash Laird

Taneshia Nash Laird is a tri-sector leader who has positively impacted the nonprofit, government and business sectors. She is noted for her ability to identify the potential of an organization, create an effective strategy to optimize that potential, and then nurture the organization into recognized success. Due to her time in appointed city, state and national roles, Laird also understands the legislative and government environments needed to support both nonprofits and commercial businesses.

In 2018 she assumed the role of president and CEO of Newark Symphony Hall, a failing vintage 1925 performing arts center in Newark, NJ and guided the nonprofit’s board through a shift to a mission-aligned revenue model, implementation of a plan to eliminate nearly a half a million dollars in debt, and capital improvement plan to address decades of deferred maintenance. Despite the onset of the global pandemic which initially eliminated 100% of earned revenue after the NJ governor’s executive order to cancel public performances, Laird increased earned revenue from operations by 100% over prior years by pivoting to film and television rentals for the 2,800 seat main theater. Her successes included a full season of USA Network’s “America’s Big Deal’’ and episodes of Hulu’s “Wu-Tang: An American Saga”.

Laird mounted a capital campaign in December 2019 and has raised $15 million in new contributions, inclusive of a $11 million in state budget line items ($5m FY22, $6m FY23), the first such budget appropriations for the organization in more than fifteen years. Through her leadership, Newark Symphony Hall also secured a $2 million corporate gift and $900,00 in national foundation gifts, among other grants, to build the organization’s operational capacity and grow artistic programming.

Laird’s prior roles include executive director of the Arts Council of Princeton, regional director of the US Women’s Chamber of Commerce, executive director of the Trenton Downtown Association and director of economic development for the city of Trenton, NJ where she managed a redevelopment portfolio of more than a quarter billion in projects. In 2009, NJ Governor Jon Corzine appointed Laird a commissioner to the Urban Enterprise Zone Authority and in 2011 she co-founded MIST Harlem, a multi-venue entertainment center which, through her efforts, initially received an allocation of the federal stimulus program facility bonds, but was ultimately financed with a $20 million allocation of New Markets Tax Credits and leveraged loans from Goldman Sachs Urban Investment Group and Prudential’s social investing.

A recognized expert in community economic development, Laird has been a keynote speaker at the International Economic Development Council’s annual conference. Laird’s service to the field includes her role as a board member of the National Independent Venue Foundation, and co-chair of the Shuttered Venues Operating Grant (SVOG) Implementation Committee for the National Independent Venue Association (NIVA), the 2020-founded trade association that successfully lobbied for $16 billion in SBA SVOG relief for the live entertainment industry.