Coleman Award for Excellence in Community Service

Introduction

The University of Pittsburgh Institute of Politics recognizes that the collective identity of any region is largely demonstrated by the overall values and priorities embraced by the people who live there. In Southwestern Pennsylvania, we place significant value on individuals who have a strong commitment to serve the region. To honor one of our community’s greatest civic servants and to recognize those who have followed in his path, the Institute of Politics created the Morton “Moe” Coleman Award for Excellence in Community Service.

History of the Coleman Award

The purpose of the Coleman Award is twofold. It creates a lasting tribute to the Institute’s founding director, Moe Coleman, for the substantial and enduring contributions he has made to the Southwestern Pennsylvania region in the areas of public policy and governance, education, health and human services, and human equity. The award also recognizes elected and nonelected community leaders who, by personal example and sustained generosity, have made a significant impact in the region. Nominees for this award should be outstanding individuals whose leadership and efforts have advanced the quality of life enjoyed by the citizens of Southwestern Pennsylvania. Learn more by watching this YouTube video.

2026 Ceremony

October 1, 2026
6:00 – 8:00 pm 
Heinz History Center
1212 Smallman Street – Pittsburgh, PA 15222 

Award Criteria

The award recognizes and honors an exceptional individual who makes community service a way of life. This individual must exemplify the best in community service through a sense of caring and responsibility for others and must do so in a way that connects citizens and solves community problems.

Specifically, the honoree is an individual who, over a sustained period of time:

• Gives freely and unselfishly of his or her time to community activities;
• Inspires others to serve and acts as a role model;
• Creates connections in the community that enhance coordination and collaboration in solving our region’s challenges;
• Has a positive impact upon the direction and success of community projects, programs or individuals; and
• Improves the lives of others.

To be eligible for the award, an individual must demonstrate significant and lasting contributions to the community beyond what is expected as a part of his or her professional life and/or demonstrate service to the community through participation on boards, volunteerism, and other activities that lie outside the scope of his or her current career.

2026 Awardees

The Institute of Politics is pleased to announce the 2026 Coleman Award winners. We celebrated their work at a special dinner that took place at the Senator John Heinz History Center on Thursday, October 1 as part of the Institute’s Regional Progress Forum. To learn more about that program, please visit the Regional Progress Forum page.

Tom Baker proudly serves as Chief Executive Officer of Variety- The Children's Charity of Pittsburgh. With a mission to empower children with disabilities to live life to the fullest, Variety provides life-changing mobility and communication equipment to ensure our most vulnerable kids are no longer left out, left behind, or excluded. Variety focuses on mobility, communication, and inclusion for children and families in 59 counties in PA. In the 2024-2025 fiscal year Tom guided the Variety team in providing a record breaking 1,108 pieces of life changing adaptive equipment. Tom and the team will also be presenting their 10,000^th piece of equipment on September 22, 2026.

For over 15 years Tom served in senior leadership roles for two organizations, North Hills Community Outreach and Big Brothers Big Sisters of Greater Pittsburgh (BBBSPGH), with which he had a longtime tenure as a volunteer before joining the professional staff. Between 2008-2023 he was Executive Director of North Hills Community Outreach (NHCO) and served as the Chief Community Affairs Officer and Vice President of Programs for BBBSPGH. Tom has volunteered thousands of hours of service as a Big Brother to his BBBS little brothers Preston (since 2002), Eric (since 2010), E.J. (since 2015), Eddie (since 2018), and Royce (since 2025).

Baker is the Founder and Chief Program Officer of Get Involved!, Inc., a 501c3 public charity non-profit organization that educates and empowers young leaders through the annual Pittsburgh Service Summit, Fast Track Community Leadership program, Power Hour leadership series, and Student Empowership Conference. Since February 2008, he has spoken with over 500,000 students, young professionals, and community leaders at more than 500 colleges, corporations, associations, and civic groups across the country. 

Baker was twice elected to serve on the Pittsburgh North Regional Chamber of Commerce Board of Directors and is the current Chair of the Board. He has served on several non-profit boards including Allegheny County Library Association, Vincentian Collaborative System, Visit Pittsburgh, Breathe Pennsylvania, Queen’s Gambit, Special Olympics of Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh Cares, LifeSpan Inc., National Student Partnerships, Greenfield Organization, North Hills School District Foundation, and the Baierl Family YMCA.

As a former two term County Councilman, Tom was elected in 2013 and re-elected in 2017 to represent District 1 in Allegheny County. Councilman Baker served on several committees during his 8 years on Council including Marketing and Public Outreach (Chair), Economic Development and Housing, Parks, Education, Health and Human Services, Government Reform, Public Safety, the Allegheny County Elections Board (Chair), and was also Caucus Chairman. He represented nearly 100,000 residents on Allegheny County Council.

Baker and his wife, Erin, have been married since 2004 and live in Ross Township with their daughter, Lila, who was born in 2018. The Baker’s were honored as one of the "Couples for a Cure" in 2012 by the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. They fund and have presented dozens of annual scholarships and internship funding opportunities to students at Millersville University, Indiana University of PA, Pittsburgh Job Corps, Taylor Allderdice High School, and North Hills High School.

Mark Nordenberg has held many key leadership positions during his long career at the University of Pittsburgh, including Distinguished Service Professor of Law, Dean of the School of Law, and Chancellor of the University.  During his nearly two decades of service as Chancellor, Pitt achieved dramatically higher levels of quality and impact on virtually every front, and the higher education and healthcare sector played a critical role in the rebirth of the regional economy.  After stepping down as Chancellor in 2014, he served as Chair of Pitt’s Institute of Politics and Director of its Dick Thornburgh Forum for Law & Public Policy, positions that he left on July 1, as he moves toward retirement.

Nordenberg has received many honors, including recognition, with CMU President Jared Cohon, as Pittsburgh’s Person-of-the-Year by Pittsburgh magazine and as a History-Maker by the Senator John Heinz History Center. He also received the Elsie Hilliard Hillman Lifetime Achievement Award for Excellence in Public Service and the Lifetime Achievement in Governance Award from the National Association of Corporate Directors, Three Rivers Chapter, reflecting his long board service at the Bank of New York Mellon, the BNY Mellon Foundation for Southwestern Pennsylvania, Manchester Bidwell, Pitt, Thiel College and UPMC and his work as founding co-chair, with President Cohon, of the Pittsburgh Digital Greenhouse, Pittsburgh Life Sciences Greenhouse, and Pittsburgh Robotics Foundry.

In the aftermath of the deadly anti-Semitic attack at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue, Nordenberg served on the independent committee created by the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh to fairly disburse donations made to its “victims of terror fund.” He and President Cohon worked together to lay the foundation for the creation of the Collaboratory Against Hate, a joint research initiative of CMU and Pitt.  He is the founding co-chair, with Laura Ellsworth, of the Eradicate Hate Global Summit, recognized as the most comprehensive anti-hate conference in the world.  For this work, the two of them have been awarded the Pursuers of Peace Award by the Rodef Shalom congregation and the Righteous Among the Neighbors Award by the Holocaust Center of Pittsburgh and the LIGHT Education Initiative.

Following the 2020 census, Nordenberg was appointed Chair of Pennsylvania’s Legislative Reapportionment Commission by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. The Commission produced a plan that was responsive to significant population and demographic shifts, adopted by a bipartisan vote within the Commission itself, unanimously upheld by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, and widely praised by good government groups.

He and Dr. Nikki Nordenberg, who met in college, have been married for fifty-five years and have three grown children and four wonderful grandsons.

Guillermo Velazquez is the Executive Director of the Pittsburgh Hispanic Development Corporation (PHDC) where, for the past ten years, he has been responsible for leading and advancing PHDC’s operations and implementing its mission. Its mission is to improve the lives of Latinos in our region, to attract Latinos to the Pittsburgh area, to support existing and new Latino businesses, and to increase Latino investment in the area. 

Guillermo has been helping entrepreneurs since he graduated from the Instituto Politecnico Nacional (IPN) in Mexico City.  His vocation to help entrepreneurs began at Desarrollo Empresarial Mexicano, an entrepreneurship program that teaches entrepreneurs how to start, manage and operate a new business.  This program and his interest in other cultures (he speaks Spanish, English, Portuguese, French and Italian) led him to Pittsburgh in 1996, when he took a position with the World Trade Center Pittsburgh to help companies in Western Pennsylvania expand and develop their international markets.

Using his education and experience in this field, as well as his experience as a Latino immigrant and his knowledge of the needs of other Latino immigrants, Guillermo has shaped PHDC into an organization that operates a Business Incubator, Housing Initiative and Employment Program.  He and the staff help immigrants in Southwestern Pennsylvania to start and operate businesses, obtain professional licenses and certifications, secure loans, find housing with reputable landlords, buy their first home, find work with fair conditions and reasonable pay, and to prepare for and to navigate an ever changing, and sometimes hostile, environment.  All of the services are provided in English, Spanish or Portuguese.  These services are vital to help immigrants overcome persistent barriers, such as language access, that otherwise would keep them from fully participating in the larger community or from achieving their dreams.  PHDC has incorporated over 260 Latino-owned businesses, 109 of them women-owned, and provided services to more than 500 businesses.  The incubator has led to the creation of 771 new jobs and has had an estimated economic impact of approximately $100 Million in the region’s economy.

Guillermo understands that helping people is a shared effort in thriving communities.  He began collaborations with 70 other organizations that support PHDC’S mission. His efforts extend beyond PHDC.  He currently serves on the Board of Trustees of the Community College of Allegheny County, and the boards of Casa San Jose, the Hebrew Free Loan Association, and the Community Justice Project.  He is Co-Chair of the Immigrants and Internationals Advisory Council of Allegheny County Department of Human Services, Office of Equity and Engagement, a Commissioner of the LGBTQIA+ Commission of the City of Pittsburgh, and Steering Committee Member of the Collaborative for Immigrant Impact.

Guillermo’s adopted home is Pittsburgh, and he hopes to make a lasting contribution to its continued growth and vitality. 

2026 Coleman Award for Excellence in Community Service recipients: Guillermo Velazquez, Tom Baker, and Mark Nordenberg

Past Coleman Award Honorees

Please note that the titles and organizations listed reflect the positions held by awardees when they received the award.