Described by The New York Times as the person “often sought out in…thorny situations,” Bart M. Schwartz is a founder and the chairman of Guidepost Solutions, where he provides compliance, ethics, and integrity monitoring and investigative services. He is a former Chief of the Criminal Division of the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York.
For more than 30 years, Mr. Schwartz has managed sensitive and complex matters for a wide array of clients, including government agencies, international corporations, and not-for-profits. He served as chairman of the Compliance Committee and a member of the Audit Committee of the board of HMS Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ:HMSY). He served as the first chairman of the Board of the public biopharma company KADMON. He also serves on the Board of Directors for philanthropic organizations, including the Police Athletic League of New York City where he is President, as well as the Stuyvesant High School Alumni Board of Directors.
In 2019, Dr. Benjamin Carson the Secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the U. S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York selected Mr. Schwartz to be the federal monitor for five years over the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA), pursuant to an agreement reached among HUD, SDNY, NYCHA, and the City of New York. NYCHA is the country’s largest housing authority with approximately 600,000 residents, 2300 buildings and over 300 developments. Throughout the five-year monitorship, Mr. Schwartz and his team oversaw the implementation of the HUD Agreement aimed at achieving decent, safe, and sanitary living conditions for NYCHA’s residents.
In April 2016, Mr. Schwartz was retained by the State of New York to conduct a review of all grants and approvals in certain programs and operations in the “Buffalo Billion” (Nano Economic Development Program) for improper lobbying and undisclosed conflicts of interest and to make recommendations for improvements in its operations.
From 2015 to 2018, Mr. Schwartz served as the Department of Justice-appointed monitor of General Motors (GM), arising out of GM’s deferred prosecution settlement of charges related to making and selling cars with defective ignition switches.
Mr. Schwartz recently served as a senior member of the Guidepost team assisting the University of Michigan with implementing recommended remediation efforts in the aftermath of sexual harassment charges. He and the team worked collaboratively with the University’s stakeholders to create a more dynamic program and promote a culture of safety and inclusion.
Amongst his many assignments and at the request of the New York Attorney General, Mr. Schwartz was appointed receiver of two Madoff feeder funds with assets of $1.2 billion and succeeded in distributing $2 billion to the victims through fund management, investments to preserve value, and litigation.
Mr. Schwartz is the recipient of numerous awards and recognitions. He was recognized by Lexology Index: Thought Leaders USA 2025; Who’s Who Legal: Thought Leaders GIR 2024; Crain’s New York 2025 Notable Leaders in Philanthropy and 2023 Notable Nonprofit Board Leaders, and Compliance Week 2023 Excellence in Compliance Award. He is also on City & State New York’s 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2025 Law Power 100 list; 2025 Who’s Who in Emerging Tech list; 2025 The Responsible 100 Alumni list; 2024 Trailblazers in Law list; 2020 50 Over 50 Age Disruptors list and its 2025 50 Over 50 Alumni list. In 2022, the National Law Journal named Mr. Schwartz a Trailblazer in Crisis Communications and The American Lawyer named him a Top-Rated Lawyer.
Did You Know?
Bart was at Woodstock!
