Matt A. Mayer is the President of Provisum Strategies where he provides strategic and tactical political and policy advice to public and private-sector clients. Mayer also serves as President of Opportunity Ohio, as a Visiting Fellow with The Heritage Foundation, America's top think tank, where he writes and speaks on national security and federalism issues, and as a Research Fellow at the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs. Mayer's first book, Homeland Security and Federalism: Protecting America from Outside the Beltway (with Foreward by the Honorable Edwin Meese III), argued for reversing the federalization of homeland security by returning power to states and localities. Formerly, Mayer served as the President of the Buckeye Institute for Public Policy Solutions, Ohio's top free market think tank. Under Mayer's leadership, the Buckeye Institute became an influential trendsetter. Mayer also launched an innovative, best-in-class website attracting over 7 million data searches and released several game-changing reports on how best to fix Ohio, including on reducing Ohio's costly governments, reforming criminal justice and Medicaid programs, transforming government pensions for today's economy, and reinvigorating Ohio's systemically weak private sector. Mayer was a senior official at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security under the leadership of Secretaries Tom Ridge and Michael Chertoff where he provided DHS leaders with policy and operational advice as the Counselor to the Deputy Secretary and where he headed the $3.5 billion terrorism preparedness office charged with developing initiatives to transform America to meet the demands of a post-9/11 environment. Mayer came to DHS from Colorado where he served Governor Bill Owens as the Deputy Director for the Department of Regulatory Agencies. Mayer co-developed Colorado's Regulatory Notice system that utilizes electronic mail to notify stakeholders of all proposed regulations before those regulations become final. The Regulatory Notice system earned the Denver Business Journal's 2003 "Innovative Product/Service Award" for making government more transparent and accountable. Prior to joining Governor Owens' team, Mayer served as a deputy in Colorado Senator Wayne Allard's reelection effort in 2002, and ran a widely hailed congressional campaign for a first-time candidate. As a result of his campaign work, the Colorado Statesman selected Mayer for its 2002 "Rising Star Award."