Susan Ochs, a financial services and economic policy expert who worked in the Clinton and Obama administrations, is Gov.-elect Mikie Sherrill’s choice to serve as Commissioner of Banking and Insurance.
Ochs had served as the director of legislative affairs at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission from 1997 to 1999, as a senior economic and business policy advisor to Governors James E. McGreevey and Richard J. Codey, and as a senior advisor at the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Financial Stability.
A frequent CNBC analyst, Ochs has led her own consulting firm since 2021 and is an adjunct professor at Fordham Law School. She’s worked in the private financial services industry, as was the founder of The Better Banking Project, which sought to improve financial industry culture. She is a former chief of staff at The Rockefeller Foundation.
The Monroe Township resident has an Economics degree from Duke University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Ochs will succeed Justin Zimmerman, who joined Gov. Phil Murphy’s cabinet in 2023 after Marlene Caride resigned to become a Superior Court judge. A former State Senate staffer and DOBI chief of staff, Zimmerman had been interested in staying on in the Sherrill administration.
