Paul Benson Named Senior Director of Public Finance Research Cluster

ATLANTA — After a national search, Paul Benson (M.S. ’01, M.P.A. ’07) has been named the senior director of Georgia State University’s Public Finance Research Cluster (PFRC).

“U.S. News & World Report regularly ranks our college among the nation’s top five in public finance research and teaching,” said Dean Thomas J. Vicino of the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, where the PFRC is housed. “Almost since our founding, Paul Benson has worked closely with our faculty and research staff in this area. He is highly qualified and deeply experienced in the cluster and its mission, vision and operations, and will lead it in innovative and forward-looking ways.”

The PFRC enables informed and effective governance at all levels worldwide. PFRC experts provide objective and timely research, technical assistance and training to inform decision-makers, build public-sector capacity and contribute to scholarship. The cluster consists of the International Center for Public Policy (ICePP), the Center for State and Local Finance (CSLF) and the Fiscal Research Center (FRC), each of which has built its own well-respected niche within the larger public finance realm.

Benson brings 27 years of experience in the development and management of sponsored research, executive training and technical assistance for domestic and international partners related to public finance. He first joined the ICePP, a center now housed within the PFRC, as an administrative specialist in 1997, and later was its assistant director and associate director. Benson’s early experience in ICePP included his work on Georgia State University’s $19.5 million Russia tax reform project in the late 1990s — the largest sponsored project in GSU history at the time. Since then, he has helped build the international reputation of ICePP and the cluster and has supported nearly 300 sponsored projects and more than 500 training programs worth more than $100 million for the university.

“Being at Georgia State University has its perks,” Benson said. “I have had the privilege, through my career, of working alongside and being mentored by national and international public finance experts in our college, most notably AYSPS and ICePP founders Roy Bahl and Jorge Martinez-Vazquez, performance budgeting scholar Katherine Willoughby, and tax economist Sally Wallace. They significantly shaped my leadership skills, making me a perfect fit for this position with the PFRC.”

Benson has helped to define the strategic goals of the cluster. During the past year, he has served as PFRC’s interim senior director. Under his leadership, the cluster has diversified its research products and expanded its international network. As a result, PFRC has recently evaluated the impact of Georgia’s Dual Enrollment Program. The cluster will host a cohort of Nepalese public servants for a weeklong training program later this year. And PFRC recently reconnected with the University of Indonesia, which in the past has sent significant numbers of early career public finance professionals to AYSPS for a tailored master’s degree program.

Benson holds an M.P.A. and an M.A. from Georgia State University, along with a B.A. from Central College in Iowa.

“This is an opportune moment for the center as we seek to build on its national and international reputation and increase its impact on public-sector research,” Vicino said. “Mr. Benson’s long tenure in cultivating and managing international and domestic projects positions him well for this leadership role.”