Marina L. Weiss

Marina L. Weiss is Senior Vice President for Public Policy and Government Affairs of the March of Dimes. In addition, Weiss is a board member of the National Health Quality Forum; a member of Independent Sector's Public Affairs Committee; a member of the Finance Committee of the National Academy of Social Insurance; a policy adviser to the "Covering Kids and Families Project" of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; a member of the Tax Coalition Board of Directors; a member of the Roosevelt Institution's National Advisory Board; and has served on various technical advisory committees for the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Institute of Medicine, the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy for State Health Policy.

Weiss joined the March of Dimes in January 1997 after more than 15 years of legislative work in the U.S. Senate and 3 years as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy and principal health policy adviser to Secretaries Lloyd Bentsen and Robert Rubin at the U.S. Treasury Department. Immediately prior to joining the Foundation, Weiss was Director of Public Policy and Government Relations at Powers, Pyles, Sutter and Verville, a Washington law firm specializing in healthcare issues.

From 1986 through 1993, Weiss was chief counsel for Health, Income Security and Budget of the Senate Committee on Finance, with responsibility for directing staff legislative work relating to budget issues and all programs under the Social Security Act, including: Old-Age Survivors and Disability (OASDI) Insurance, Railroad Retirement, Medicare, Medicaid, Supplemental Security Income (SSI), Unemployment Compensation, Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), Child Support Enforcement, Child Care, Title XX Social Services Block Grant, Child Protection, Foster Care and Adoption Assistance, and the Maternal and Child Health Block Grant. From 1979 to 1986, Weiss was a legislative assistant in the office of Senator Lloyd Bentsen with responsibility for budget, health, and income security issues.

Before moving to Washington D.C., Weiss was on the faculty of the Political Science department at Texas A&M University, where she also served as principal investigator and technical adviser to State and local government agencies through the University's Center for Urban Programs.

Weiss has an undergraduate degree from the American University, a master's degree from the University of Texas at Austin and a doctorate from Texas A&M University. She and her family live in Alexandria, Virginia.