Erin R. Scherzer / Executive Director

Erin Russ Scherzer joined NSBHF as its Executive Director in 2019. She is on the Executive Committee of the National Police Accountability Project‘s Board of Directors.  For over eight years before joining NSBHF, Erin worked in the Office of Career Services at Seton Hall University School of Law, first as an Associate Director and then as the Executive Director. Prior to Seton Hall Law, Erin was a Business Law Associate in the New York office of Goodwin Procter LLP, where she represented private equity funds and lenders and provided pro bono legal assistance to individuals and non-profit organizations.  Throughout her career and in her personal life, Erin has been a champion of equity and inclusion. At Seton Hall Law, Erin served on the Dean’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee and was the law school’s designee to the Supreme Court of New Jersey Committee on Women in the Courts. At Goodwin Procter LLP, Erin was a member of the firm’s Committee on Racial and Ethnic Diversity.

As a firm believer in the power of civic engagement to ensure that communities truly serve each and every person, Erin has been active in her community on a wide range of areas from land use to public school education matters. Erin was the founding Co-Chair of the Maplewood Community Board on Police, having been appointed given her advocacy to address community-law enforcement relations. Erin was one of the community leaders who worked together with municipal officials to research and create the Maplewood Community Board on Police, which was the first suburban police board in New Jersey.  Her work on the Maplewood Community Board on Police includes advocating for a crisis intervention social worker program, conducting departmental use of force reviews, and creating a structure to review internal affairs matters.