The dynamic force behind Delancey Street is its President & CEO, Dr. Mimi Halper Silbert. Although she does not share the same background as her fellow residents, she lives at Delancey Street, abides by its rules, and takes no salary. Her tenacious spirit and unlimited energy have built an organization unique in its entrepreneurial and self-governing structure. Her dedication in enacting her vision of an educational community of change has inspired residents to break their destructive cycles and take responsibility for themselves and others. Dr. Silbert has garnered national and international attention for her achievement at Delancey Street, demonstrating her belief that the people who are the problem can, themselves, become the solution.
Mimi Silbert
Mimi Silbert serves as the President, Chairman of the Board, and CEO of the Delancey Street Foundation, which Dr. Karl Menninger called “the best and most successful rehabilitation program I have studied in the world”. Delancey Street serves ex-felons, prostitutes, substance abusers, homeless, and others who have hit bottom in five national centers, located in New York, New Mexico, North Carolina, Los Angeles, and headquartered in San Francisco, all living drug, alcohol and crime free. For over 35 years, Delancey Street has provided residents with academic, vocational, and social skills, and the discipline, values, and attitudes they need to live in society legitimately and successfully at no cost to the client or tax payer. There are currently over 14,000 successful graduates. In 1996, Delancey formed a new division called Delancey CIRCLE (Coalition to Implement Revitalized Communities, Lives, Education and Economies) through which Delancey collaborates with numerous public and private agencies to adapt the Delancey model. Under this division, Delancey has developed and run a program in a jail, “Choices”, based on Delancey principles, replicated in other countries (Singapore), collaborated with the California Department of Corrections where Silbert designed and implemented a pilot program for parolees (BASN), collaborated with the Eisenhower Foundation for several replications in the United States, collaborated with the Federal Bureau of Prisons, INS and National Institute of Corrections to develop prison and parole programs for the Mariel Cubans and finally, under this division, Delancey has run for 10 years a charter public high school for at-risk youths, Life Learning Academy, of which Silbert is the Headmaster.

Delancey Street’s home on the San Francisco waterfront, the Embarcadero Triangle, is the culmination of the Delancey creed of self-help. Silbert was the developer and Delancey its own contractor as they built this almost 400,000 square foot mixed-use development for their home. With union support, they trained over 300 formerly unemployable people in the building trades, and built a complex that holds up to 500 residents and a vast array of retail, educational, and recreational facilities which Pulitzer prize winning architectural critic Allan Temko called “a masterpiece of social design”. The complex, which has won numerous awards, is the largest self-managed, self-built self-help complex in the country. There, Delancey runs its national moving company, catering, a screening room considered one of the finest in San Francisco, the highly regarded Delancey Street Restaurant, and a gem of a Coffee House-Bookstore-Art Gallery called Crossroads Café.

Although Delancey Street is her primary work, Silbert is also a recognized national expert in criminal justice. As a criminal justice planner and evaluator, Silbert has directed the evaluation of over 100 projects through such agencies as the National Institute of Mental Health, the National Institute of Corrections, and the John D. Rockefeller Foundation. She has designed adult and juvenile corrections master plans for numerous cities and states, evaluated the prison system for California Department of Corrections, and designed and conducted the largest study in the country on Prostitution and Sexual Assault, considered a breakthrough at the time, and a field in which she has published extensively. She wrote, designed, and implemented a revamp of San Francisco’s juvenile justice system which independent evaluators called “phenomenally successful”. In her 40 years as a trainer, Silbert has designed curriculae and provided training to over 50 police, sheriff and probation departments.

As a result of her pioneering work, Silbert has received numerous awards including 9 honorary doctorate degrees ranging from Brandeis University, the University of Massachusetts, through San Francisco State University and Dominican University and has received the University of San Francisco President’s Medallion (1993) and the University of California at San Francisco’s Highest Medal (2001). She has been honored by police, professional, and community groups as well as national awards ranging from America’s Award, Mahatma Gandhi Humanitarian Award, The Living Legacy Award from the Women’s International Center, The National Caring Award, The Tree of Life Award from the Jewish National Fund, The Pope John XXIII Award from the Italian Catholic Federation, The Muslim Humanitarian Award, The National Common Cause’s Public Service Achievement Award, League of Women Voters “Women Who Could Be President” Award, and has been given the key to San Francisco and had 6 “Mimi Silbert Days” along with many commendations, certificates, plaques, and awards from Presidents Bush, Carter, Reagan, numerous Senate and Congressional leaders, the New Mexico, California and Delaware State Legislators, the New Mexico and California Governors and many local Boards of Supervisors.

Silbert has served on a number of Boards. She was appointed to the National Institute of Justice by President Carter and to the California State Board of Corrections five times, (twice by Governor Dukemejien, once by Governor Davis and twice by Governor Schwarzenegger), to the Blue Ribbon Commission on Inmate Population Management by the California Senate, to California’s Expert Panel on Parole and Re-entry, to the State Police Commission, California Standards Authority, and served as Founding Chairman for 10 years of Community Mediation Boards developed by Ray Shonholtz, was a trustee of Golden Gate University, on the Board of the New College, and headed numerous task forces including the California State Advisory Group for OJJDP and the San Francisco Welfare to Work Task Force.

She has been featured on ABC’s 20/20 in a segment titled “The Power of Mimi”, on This Is Your Life, Oprah Winfrey Prime Time Special, Sunday Morning with Charles Kuralt, John Stossell Goes to Washington, Street Stories with Ed Bradley, Good Morning America, several segments on ABC’s World News Tonight with Peter Jennings including featuring Silbert as “Person of the Week”, PBS’ New Heroes, The Jane Pauley Show along with over 30 segments on local channels, and international media including Asia, Africa, Europe, Central and South America through USIA. Her work has been written up as chapters in numerous books and in the printed media ranging from the London Times, Financial Times, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post through A&E Biography, Fast Company, Chronicle of Philanthropy, Hope Magazine, Reader’s Digest, Parade Magazine and People Magazine as well as many other local, national and international newspapers.

Silbert has two sons, David and Greg Silbert. David Silbert is a partner in the law firm Keker and Van Nest in San Francisco, and his family includes his wife, Rebecca Silbert, a Federal Public Defender, and their three children Eliana, Joshua and Sarah. Greg Silbert works in the Solicitor General’s Office in the New York Attorney General’s Office, and his family includes his wife, Laura Guthrie, working as an attorney at Brooklyn Legal Aid, and their two children Zelda and Gabriel.

Silbert holds a bachelors degree in English from the University of Massachusetts (1963) and Masters (1965) and Doctoral Degrees (1968) in Counseling Psychology and Criminology from the University of California at Berkeley, from whom she was awarded UC Berkeley’s Prestigious Alumni of the Year award (1991), along with being named one of 100 Berkeley Fellows (2003), an Honorific Society. Mostly though, Mimi Silbert has lived with and cast her lot with society’s “outcasts” to prove her belief that with struggle, courage, and discipline, together they can be “winners” and transform impossible dreams into reality by pooling their resources, supporting one another, and living lives of purpose and integrity.

Click here to view Dr. Mimi Halper Silbert's complete resume (PDF Document)

Related Media
"15 Most Influential Women In Bay Area Non-Profits " San Francisco Business Times (5/05)
"Up and Out" (Massachusettes Magazine, Winter 1992)
"Making Rehabilitation Into A Serious Business" (Los Angeles Times, 3/02)
"Mending Broken Lives" (Monitor on Psychology, 12/01)
"Delancey Street pioneer gets second state term." 17 Apr. 1999.
"Break Out" (People, 7/98)
"She Helps Them Help Themselves" (Fast Company, 7/98)
Flatlow, Sheryl. "Delancey Street: Where drug addicts, criminals, and the homeless go to turn their lives around." A&E Biography Aug. 1997.
"Mimi Silbert: The Angel of Delancey Street" (The Reporter, Spring 1997)
"Helping Others Help Themselves: An Interview With Mimi Silbert" (United Airlines Hemispheres, 2/96)
"Mimi's Mission" complete, pp 1-5, pp 6-11 (San Francisco Examiner Magazine, 10/96)
"Brain Trust" (San Francisco Focus, 7/95)
"Hitting Bottom Can Be The Beginning" (Parade Magazine, 3/92)
"Pope John Award to Mimi Silbert — Work At Delancey Street" (Bollettino, 7/91)
"Remarkable Women" (San Francisco Focus, 3/91)
"Alumna Of The Year Mimi Silbert" (California Monthly, 12/90)
Stein, Ruthe. "Mimi Silbert Stays Tough For Delancey." San Francisco Chronicle 1 Mar. 1990.
"The Lady of the House" complete, pp 1-3, pp 4-6 (San Francisco Examiner Image Magazine, 7/88)
"With Emmy On Our Minds" (Variety, 6/84)
"John Maher and Mimi Silbert Among Their Ex-Cons at Rehab Center" (People, 4/78)
Chapter in Book, "Passionaries, Turning Compassion into Action," (Templeton Foundation Press 2006)
Chapter in Book, "The Heart of America." (Health Communications, Inc. 2004)
"Pine Manor College Goes to San Francisco to Honor Mimi Silbert." (Pine Manor College Bulletin Summer 2004)
"S.F. prostitutes: scared teen-agers." (Oakland Tribune 10/80)
"How children become prostitutes." (Chicago Tribune 2/81)
"To Some Rape Victims, Justice Is Beyond Reach." (The New York Times 10/90)

This Is Your Life Pt. 1 (Quicktime)
This Is Your Life Pt. 2 (Quicktime)
This Is Your Life Pt. 3 (Quicktime)
The Minerva (Quicktime)
U.C. Alumni Awards (Quicktime)
UCSF Medalist 2001 (Quicktime)
San Francisco Foundation - Community Leadership Awards 2003 (Quicktime)
"The Power of Mimi" on 20/20 (Quicktime)
"Person of The Week" World News (Quicktime)