Laura Wood
Director, Local Democracy Strategy
- Email:[email protected]
- Hometown:Brooklyn, NY
Laura Wood is Vice President of Democracy at the Local Policy Lab and Director of Local Democracy Strategy at the National Civic League. She leads work focused on strengthening local democratic institutions, voter engagement, and election preparedness.
From 2022–2023, Laura was a Leadership in Government Fellow with the Open Society Foundations, where she partnered with cities across the country on democracy and civic engagement initiatives — work that ultimately led her to the Local Policy Lab. She has also advised The States Project on state-level strategies to ensure safe and secure elections.
Laura is an attorney who spent thirteen years in New York state and city government. She served as New York City’s Chief Democracy Officer, leading DemocracyNYC, a mayoral initiative to increase civic participation. In 2021, she led a citywide public education campaign preparing voters for the implementation of Ranked Choice Voting, reaching an estimated 90 percent of New Yorkers.
Earlier in her career, she served as Chief Counsel to the New York State Senate and as senior advisor and special counsel to the New York State Attorney General. She began her legal career as a litigator at Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler and clerked for federal judges Rebecca Pallmeyer and Julio M. Fuentes.
