Yinnon Ezra MBE

Director of Recreation and Heritage

Yinnon Ezra joined Hampshire County Council as Director of Recreation and Heritage in March 2002. He moved from Kent County Council where he had worked as Director of Arts and Libraries and the County Officer for Community and Cultural Services for 12 years. Prior to that he was Director of Community and Leisure Services for the London Borough of Ealing, where he started his career in the voluntary sector as a youth worker.

Hampshire County Council’s Recreation and Heritage department manages libraries, arts centres, outdoor centres, sports and arts development, museums, a state-of-the-art record office, major country parks, the River Hamble and Community and Adult learning, public rights of way and tourism.

A member of the County Council's Corporate Management Team where he leads on Community Engagement and involvement, Yinnon sees wider access to Hampshire’s cultural resources as a key objective of the department, and he is a passionate advocate of working with communities that do not traditionally access these services. He looks for innovative approaches to expanding use and is relentless in demonstrating the importance of these services in improving the quality of life for all. The Discovery Centre concept - first referred to in the DCMS document about libraries Framework for the Future - is an example of this achieving a 50 per cent increase in use and leading the way as one of 13 national Cultural Pathfinders. Improvements in performance matter to Yinnon and this is best illustrated through the achievement in the Culture Block of the Comprehensive Performance Assessment and a full set of nine Chartermarks for the Department.

Yinnon is an advisor to the Local Government Association and is particularly involved in developing creative links between local government, government departments and a number of Non-Departmental Public Bodies. In February 2008 Yinnon was appointed by the Prime Minister as a National trustee of the Heritage Lottery Fund/National Memorial Fund. He is also a national Board Member of the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council, and on the governing body of the University of Winchester and is a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

Yinnon Ezra was awarded the MBE for service to local government in the New Year's Honours 2008. He has an MA in Social Policy, is a volunteer for the Prince’s Trust and a member of the Trust’s South East Regional Council. He was born in India in 1953, is married and has two children.