A highly accomplished attorney, transformational leader, and community changemaker, Rita McNeil Danish possesses more than 30 years of professional legal experience across a range of industries and business sectors. In her roles as partner, consultant, and now nonprofit CEO, Rita has fostered intercultural interactions that embraced and celebrated diversity, equity, and inclusion, resulting in communities that were both empowered and strengthened. Leveraging her breadth and depth of insights into municipal and government law, she has a proven history of building bridges across party, racial, and gender lines, fostering open cultures, dismantling prejudices, and empowering individuals to uniquely contribute to society.
Rita’s work is that of passion and history. Her mother, an English professor, and her father, a Chicago criminal defense attorney and civil rights leader, established a foundation committed to community, advocacy, and justice and that fueled Rita’s pursuit of law. She earned her Bachelor of Business Administration in Marketing from Howard University and her Juris Doctor from The Ohio State University College of Law. Her law career began at Schottenstein, Zox and Dunn (now Ice Miller) before she moved to the Governor’s office as Assistant Deputy Legal Counsel. She then transitioned to the Ohio Department of Commerce as Chief Legal Counsel & Acting Superintendent of the Division of Real Estate, a role in which she thrived.
In 1994, Rita served as Magistrate of Franklin County Court of Common Pleas, Domestic & Juvenile Division before she was invited by the Attorney General to serve the Ohio AG’s Civil Rights Section as Section Chief. In 1998, she moved to the City of Dayton as City Attorney & Director of Law where she began her work forging positive relationships with police. This work proved pivotal when in 2002 she moved to the City of Cincinnati where she served as City Solicitor. There she negotiated and implemented one of the nation’s landmark and most notable memorandum of agreements with the Department of Justice, delivering critical police reform.
In 2008, Rita transitioned to Vice President for Government Affairs for the Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber, and in 2010 she was recruited to the City of Greensboro to serve as City Attorney / Corporate Counsel. In 2014, she was appointed by then-Governor John Kasich to serve as a Judge in the Franklin County Court of Common Pleas Domestic & Juvenile Division.
Throughout her career, Rita has worked as Of Counsel & Associate with Crabbe, Brown & James where she transformed the culture to better encompass DEI. Additionally, Rita serves clients as the Founder, CEO, and Principal of JD2 Strategists, LLC, and formerly as the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Strategic Business Partner at Taft, Stettinius & Hollister LLP. In both roles, she diligently supports and provides counsel to small, minority- and women-owned businesses. Through collaboration and communication, Rita engages elected officials, state legislators, community stakeholders, and business leaders to find a foundation of unity on which to build systems that deliver safer communities with justice for all.
Most recently, following a comprehensive national search, Rita was appointed CEO of Signal Ohio, a new nonprofit organization rallying local support for community-centered journalism. Building and leading a statewide team, Rita is focused on launching newsrooms across the network to achieve the organization’s mission of delivering quality, unbiased information accessible to all Ohioans. With Rita’s onboarding, she now serves as part of one of the largest nonprofit news organizations.
While Rita’s professional contributions to DEI, MWBE, and community advocacy are prolific and significant, she is equally adept at combining her legal acumen, budgetary leadership, and business management to deliver strategies and vision that transform businesses. This unique set of skills is why often she is sought after to contribute to boards including her recent 5-year term appointment on the Ohio Civil Rights Commission. Additionally, she served the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center, the National Civic League, and Women’s Small Business Accelerator, and she is the Chair of the Public Contracting Committee of the ABA Section of State and Local Government Law and Chair for Women for Economic and Leadership Development (WELD).
Rita’s work includes publications that highlight municipal law and the government’s potential to provide constituents with economic equality for all. Licensed in Ohio, Illinois, and the United States Supreme Court, Rita’s vast experiences have generated recognition from Columbus Monthly where she was the cover feature and she was a Best Lawyers in America Honoree.
