After leading the Center for Business and Government (CBG) at the Kennedy School of Government for two years, Ira A. Jackson ’70 will step down from his post on August 9 to take over as president of an Atlanta-based charitable organization.

Jackson will become the first president of the Arthur M. Blank Foundation, founded in 1995 by the co-founder and CEO of Home Depot. The foundation serves young people and various civic and community causes, giving out about $37 million in grants in 2002 alone.

Jackson said he hopes to carry on his work from the Kennedy School in the public sector.

“I feel as though I am just going back out to practice CBG’s values and the School’s mission of trying to make the world a better place through...more effective governance,” he wrote in a farewell email to faculty and staff at KSG.

KSG Dean Joseph S. Nye, Jr. praised Jackson’s leadership of the CBG, which focuses on public policy research related to business and government.

“In the two years that Ira has been director, the CBG has flourished,” Nye said. “We will miss Ira’s creativity and innovation, but know that he is leaving us with a strong, self-sufficient research center.”

Before working at CBG, Jackson served as executive vice president of BankBoston for twelve years, where he worked among other things on strengthening inner-city communities through banking services. He and BankBoston recieved the Ron Brown Award for Corporate Leadership at the White House in 1999.

Jackson has also been a top policy advisor to two former mayors, Kevin White of Boston, Mass. and Kenneth Gibson of Newark, N. J.

His time at CBG marked a return to the Kennedy School, where he had been associate dean from 1975 to 1983. Jackson recieved his Masters in Public Administration there in 1975, and completed the Advanced Managment Program at the Harvard Business School in 1986.

“I will always consider the Kennedy School and Harvard as my anchor and home away from home,” Jackson wrote.

A search for Jackson’s replacement at KSG is under way.

—Staff writer Eugenia B. Schraa can be reached at schraa@fas.harvard.edu.