As reported by Politico, Chris Gates will be the next president of the Sunlight Foundation, the Washington, DC-based nonprofit that advocates for open government and creates tools that empower people to improve government transparency and accountability around the world.

“I couldn’t be more excited to join the team at Sunlight to help advance their work to bring more accountability and transparency to our politics and our government,” said Gates, in a statement. “For those of us who care deeply about the health of our democracy, these are perilous times. Our political system is swimming in anonymous money and influence, and our federal government is paralyzed and unable to respond to the challenges of our times. Our hope is that the new tools, data and information generated by Sunlight will help break through this impasse. We look forward to working with others in the reform field to fix a system that clearly isn’t working.”

Gates is currently the executive director of Philanthropy for Active Civic Engagement, part of the Council on Foundations. Previously, he served as president of America’s oldest good government organization, the National Civic League.

It's about changing the system, not the people… http://t.co/sEoyETGHn3

— Chris Gates (@GatesPACE) September 8, 2014

“Chris, who is a thought leader in the fields of democratic theory and practice and political and civic engagement, has, for the past decade, been a leading voice for strengthening democratic processes and structures and developing new approaches to both engagement and decision-making,” wrote Ellen Miller, co-founder and current president of the Sunlight Foundation, at the organization’s blog. “He and I have been colleagues for the past several years — we’ve worked together on numerous occasions — and I am truly thrilled that he will become Sunlight’s president.”

Miller went on to say that Gates will “bring a breadth of experience and style of leadership that will take us to new levels.” This fall, the Sunlight Foundation will undergo the biggest transition of leadership since its founding: last week, Sunlight Labs director Tom Lee announced that he was leaving to work at DC-based Mapbox, with James Turk stepping up to assume responsibility for the nonprofit’s powerful technology resources and development team. I look forward to seeing how both men build out the civic infrastructure, reporting group, and advocacy shop that Sunlight has established since the organization opened its doors in 2006.

[Image Credit: Sunlight Foundation]