The Fourth District comprises Ohio, western Pennsylvania, eastern Kentucky, and the northern panhandle of West Virginia. Within its borders lies a range of industries—from manufacturing and medicine to advanced technology—across a variety of communities, including older industrial cities, growing suburbs, and rural Appalachian areas.

Cleveland is home to the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland's main office serving the Fourth Federal Reserve District. The Bank also has two Fourth District branch offices in Cincinnati and Pittsburgh.

The part of the Federal Reserve’s work most visible to the American public is our role in circulating cash throughout the economy, both paper currency and coin. We ensure that financial institutions have enough physical currency on hand to satisfy the public’s demand, even if that demand spikes.

While we don’t print money—that task falls to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing and the US Mint—we do distribute currency and monitor the physical condition of bills in circulation. Every bill is distributed first from a Reserve Bank. Eventually, each bill comes back from its rounds, usually through deposits from a bank or banking institution, and then we examine it to ensure it is physically fit to remain in circulation. If not, we destroy it and replace it with a new bill.

Each US bill has a stamp on one side featuring a letter within a starburst pattern. This letter identifies which of the 12 Reserve Banks released the bill into the economy for the first time. A “D” indicates that the Cleveland Fed was the first to distribute the bill.

The US Treasury needs a bank, just as individuals do, to manage the flow of money. As the nation’s bank, the Federal Reserve serves the US Treasury in this way, and one part of that service is managing payments. Our computer systems annually process more than 299 million digital transactions with a total value of more than $770 billion. You may encounter these systems directly through Pay.gov, if you make payments to the Veterans Administration, for example, or if you pay for something in a park run by the National Park Service.

The Cleveland Fed supervises approximately 270 financial institutions headquartered in the Fourth District to ensure they operate in a safe and sound manner, provide fair access to credit, and comply with laws, regulations, and mandates. Supervised financial institutions include state member banks, savings and loan companies, and bank holding companies.

• Supervision and Regulation: Our supervision and regulation team promotes a safe banking system, fosters financial market stability, and supports compliance with laws and regulations, including those relating to consumer protection.
• Credit Risk: Credit risk employees provide liquidity to the banking system, work to avoid losses that undermine the integrity of payment systems or the credibility of the Federal Reserve System, and facilitate the implementation of monetary policy.
• Statistics and Analysis: Teams in statistics and analysis support monetary policymaking, supervision and regulation, and fiscal agency responsibilities through collecting, analyzing, and ensuring the quality of financial and banking structure information.

The Research Department’s economists and research analysts conduct high-quality academic research across a wide range of topics, looking at macroeconomic and microeconomic issues, financial markets and banking, forecasting, inflation, labor markets, and more. This research combines with regional data gathered through outreach efforts with contacts in the Fourth District to inform the monetary policymaking process. Our research and analysis also helps to inform and serve the public through our Economic Commentary series and the indicators and data that we update on a regular basis.

The Bank is home to the Center for Inflation Research, a leading resource for inflation-related content. We publish several inflation indicators and data, including the median CPI, inflation nowcasting, inflation expectations, and the Survey of Firms’ Inflation Expectations (SoFIE) to help inform the public of inflationary trends in our nation’s economy.

The Cleveland Fed’s Community Development Department studies issues that impact low- and moderate-income communities, including employability, public transportation, inequality, and fair access to borrowing money.

The department, whose work grew out of the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) of 1977, comprises economists, policy analysts, and outreach managers. The CRA requires the Federal Reserve to work with financial institutions to serve the communities where they are located, especially low- to moderate-income neighborhoods.

The Cleveland Fed works to understand all issues that impact low- to moderate-income people and communities, but the bulk of our efforts focuses on three key areas: economic and workforce development, housing, and small business.

As detailed in the Federal Reserve Act, the Reserve Bank's board of directors forms a search committee comprising its eligible Class B and Class C directors; these directors are elected or appointed to represent the public and are not bankers.

Note that Congress has expressly excluded a Reserve Bank’s Class A directors from the appointment of Reserve Bank president. As such, Class A directors are not permitted to take part in the selection of a Reserve Bank president, nor are they allowed to sit on search committees for these positions.

Typically, the committee hires a search firm to help identify a highly qualified nationwide pool of diverse candidates from inside and outside the Federal Reserve System. After considering the top applicants, the search committee will appoint the president, subject to approval by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System.

Watch: “What Happens When a Federal Reserve Bank Needs a New President?” for a brief overview of the presidential search process.

The search committee for a Federal Reserve president and chief executive officer of comprises of eligible Class B and Class C directors, typically six directors in total.

Under Section 4 of the Federal Reserve Act, each Federal Reserve Bank operates pursuant to the supervision of a board of directors in addition to the general supervision of the Board of Governors in Washington DC. The main board of the Cleveland Fed has nine members, all chosen from outside the Federal Reserve; members are divided into three classes designated A, B, and C.

The Class A and Class B directors are elected by the member commercial banks of the Fourth District. The Class C directors are appointed by the Board of Governors. Each year, one Class C director at each Reserve Bank is designated by the Board of Governors as chair of the Bank’s board of directors, and a second Class C director is designated deputy chair.

Class A directors are required to be representative of the member banks within the respective Federal Reserve District. Class B and Class C directors, meanwhile, are required to represent the public “with due but not exclusive consideration to the interests of agriculture, commerce, industry, services, labor and consumers.” Neither Class B nor Class C directors may be officers, directors, or employees of any private-sector bank or bank holding company. In addition, Class C directors may not own shares in any bank or bank holding company. For more information on the affiliation and stock holding restrictions of Class B and Class C directors, please see the Board of Governors website.

Throughout the process to appoint the Bank’s 12th president, the search committee was committed to conducting a search that was robust, transparent, fair, and inclusive. The search began November 8, 2023 and concluded with an announcement on May 29, 2024 on the appointment of Beth M. Hammack.

• Inclusivity was built into the infrastructure of the search. Although the composition of the search committee is pre-determined by law, the search committee’s diversity in gender, race, geography, and background provided important differences in perspective during the search process. Search committee members represented various sectors and communities across the entire Federal Reserve Fourth District.
  • Committee members for the search included: Heidi L. Gartland, Richard J. Kramer, Jacqueline Gamblin, Ramona Hood, Darrell McNair, Holly B. Wiedemann, and Doris Carson Williams.
• Following a formal procurement process, the Bank engaged Spencer Stuart to assist the committee. The team from Spencer Stuart was also diverse in terms of race and gender.
• The search was launched on November 8, 2023 with a formal announcement by the Bank.
• Transparency and outreach were also priorities, with the Bank providing timely and widely available information about the search and how to apply, including announcements to national and local media, social media (more than 145,000 followers of the Bank on X/Twitter and LinkedIn), updates on a dedicated Presidential Search webpage that the Bank established immediately after the search began, newsletters and email promotions, and prominent display on the homepage of the Bank’s main website, clevelandfed.org.
• The Bank widely publicized and hosted two virtual Town Halls on November 27, 2023, and January 9, 2024, that were open to the public to provide information about the search and how to apply or nominate an individual, and to answer the public’s questions. Recordings of the Town Halls were posted on the Bank’s Presidential Search webpage following the events.
• The Presidential Search webpage also included an email drop-box linked directly to Spencer Stuart for confidential nominations and self-submissions. The webpage also provided a dedicated Bank email address for the public to ask questions or send comments to the Bank. Throughout the search process, there were more than 1,200 pageviews on the Presidential Search webpages and more than 200 downloads of the job description posted there.
• The search committee placed a priority on conducting a broad search with a candidate pool that was diverse in terms of gender, race and ethnicity and background. The competitive candidate pool included executives, economists, academics, and other interested leaders from across the country. At the conclusion, the search committee unanimously agreed to appoint Beth M. Hammack the next Cleveland Fed president, subject to approval of the Board of Governors.

The president of a Federal Reserve Bank is the Bank’s chief executive officer. The president is responsible for all of the Bank's activities, including those related to monetary policy, bank supervision and regulation, and payments services. In addition, the president serves on the Federal Reserve System's monetary policymaking body the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC).

The president is responsible for establishing the organization’s strategic direction and achieving its short- and long-term objectives. The president also represents the institution before its core external constituencies: business and community leaders, educators, government officials, bankers, members of the news media, and the public.

The Cleveland Fed president participates with the other 11 Reserve Bank presidents and the members of the Board of Governors in the processes of debating and formulating US monetary policy. Each year, all 12 Reserve Bank presidents are present for FOMC discussions and voting processes, though voting members rotate yearly except for the president of the New York Fed, who has a permanent vote. The president of the Cleveland Fed alternates as a voting member of the FOMC every other year with the president of the Chicago Fed.

• Economic Research: Applies experience in finance, economics, and commerce to advise on the direction and impact of Cleveland Fed economic research on monetary policy.
• Regional Economic Intelligence: Gathers insightful, anecdotal regional economic intelligence across all communities and sectors through interactions with the Fourth District’s boards of directors and other business and community leaders. Provides guidance and recommendations to the Cleveland Fed’s board of directors with respect to setting the discount rate, that is, the interest rate charged to depository institutions on loans received from the Bank's lending facility.
• Policy Discussion and Decisionmaking: Participates in FOMC policy debates. Contributes regional insights and independent views on national and international economic issues. Participates as a thought leader in the five-year review of the long-run framework for the FOMC.
• Policy Communications: Communicates clearly across multiple constituencies to inform them of the Federal Reserve System’s monetary policy stance and actions.

The president acts as the senior supervisory presence of the Federal Reserve System within the Fourth District. While bank supervision and regulatory decisions ultimately reside with the Board of Governors, the Bank president may provide valuable input into the regulatory process through participation on joint Reserve Bank and Board of Governors committees and by providing comments on regulatory proposals.

The Cleveland Fed supervises approximately 270 financial institutions headquartered in the Fourth District to ensure they operate in a safe and sound manner, provide fair access to credit, and comply with laws, regulations, and mandates. A list of Fourth District state member banks and an overview of the regulation and supervision process can be found on our supervision webpage.

The presidents of the Cleveland Fed and Chicago Fed alternate as voting members annually, serving one-year voting terms on the FOMC.

The Cleveland Fed is a voting member in the FOMC in 2024. A list of the current voting members and Federal Reserve Bank rotation on the FOMC can be found on the Board of Governors’ website.

The FOMC comprises 12 voting members—the seven members of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and four of the remaining 11 Reserve Bank presidents, who each serve one-year terms on a rotating basis. The rotating seats are filled from the following four groups of Reserve Banks, one Bank president from each group: Boston, Philadelphia, and Richmond; Cleveland and Chicago; Atlanta, St. Louis, and Dallas; and Minneapolis, Kansas City, and San Francisco. Nonvoting Reserve Bank presidents attend the meetings of the committee, participate in the discussions, and contribute to the committee's assessment of the economy and policy options.

The FOMC holds eight regularly scheduled meetings per year. At these meetings, the committee reviews economic and financial conditions, determines the appropriate stance of monetary policy, and assesses the risks to its congressionally mandated goals of price stability and maximum employment.

In consultation with the first vice president (who also serves as the chief operating officer), other senior officers, and the board of directors, the president develops a broad vision for the organization subject to the statutory authority prescribed for the Federal Reserve Banks.

The Bank is an organization with complex, challenging, and sensitive responsibilities. Its leader must model the integrity, intellect, character, executive disposition, personal leadership, and communication skills required of an effective top executive. The president is the chief executive officer of the Bank, and is responsible for maintaining positive organizational culture with visible commitment to business results, staff engagement, talent development, and diversity, equity, inclusion, and opportunity practices.

Under the Federal Reserve Act, all presidents of Reserve Banks serve concurrent five-year terms that end on the last day of February in years ending with 1 or 6 (for example, 2026). The appointment of a president who takes office in intervening years ends upon the completion of the original term. A president of a Reserve Bank may be reappointed after serving a full term or an incomplete term.

Reserve Bank presidents are subject to mandatory retirement at age 65. However, presidents initially appointed after age 55 can, at the option of the Reserve Bank’s board of directors, be permitted to serve until attaining 10 years of service in the office or until age 75, whichever occurs first.

Incoming President and CEO Beth Hammack’s term will officially begin on August 21, 2024. She will be subject to reappointment in 2026, with a mandatory retirement date in 2037.

The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System has established a broad set of rules that prohibit the purchase of individual securities, restrict active trading, and ensure the timeliness of reporting and public disclosure by Federal Reserve policymakers and senior staff.

Reserve Bank presidents are subject to the Federal Reserve System Investment and Trading Policy for FOMC Officials, which includes a prohibition on purchasing individual stocks or sector funds; holding investments in individual bonds, agency securities, cryptocurrencies, commodities, or foreign currencies; entering into derivatives contracts; and engaging in short sales or purchasing securities on margin. Additionally, a 45-day nonretractable notice for purchases and sales of securities is required along with obtaining prior approval for such transactions and holding investments for at least one year.

The Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland expects its employees to perform their duties with honesty, integrity, and impartiality and without improper preferential treatment of any person. The Bank’s Code of Conduct outlines principles and standards for employee conduct, including rules for avoiding both actual and apparent conflicts of interest.

In the absence or disability of a Reserve Bank president, or during a vacancy in that office, the Bank’s first vice president will assume the duties of the president and CEO, following the process established by the Federal Reserve Act and the Bank’s bylaws.

Beginning on July 1, 2024, the role of interim president and CEO will be assumed by Mark S. Meder, the Bank’s first vice president and chief operating officer, ending with incoming President and CEO Hammack’s term beginning on August 21, 2024.