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The National Council on Problem Gambling is looking for a leader again.
Heather Maurer has resigned as NCPG executive director, the organization’s board of directors announced over the weekend. She’ll stay through Oct. 16 to help with the transition while the board searches for her replacement.
That’s a little more than nine months on the job. Maurer started Jan. 7.
The board did not give a reason for her departure. As Legal Sports Report detailed Monday, it follows four months of member exits over NCPG’s partnership with prediction market operator Kalshi.
Board President Derek Longmeier said in the announcement:
“The need for NCPG’s work to prevent and reduce gambling-related harm has never been greater, and we will continue to build on the strength of our partnerships.”
Two leadership searches in 20 months
Maurer was supposed to be the fresh start.
Keith Whyte, who led NCPG for more than two decades, departed in January 2025. Nancy Green stepped in as interim executive director while the board ran a nationwide search. It landed on Maurer in November 2025, hiring her from the National Association of Nurse Practitioners in Women’s Health, where she was CEO.
Now the NCPG executive director job is open again. Whyte’s exit to this weekend’s announcement is 20 months. Two searches in that span, for an organization that had one leader for most of the previous quarter century.
How the Kalshi partnership drove NCPG exits
In May, NCPG named Kalshi the first platinum member of a new Financial Services & Trading category, backed by a $2 million pledge over two years.
The exits started the next month:
- Ohio Casino Control Commission, June, citing concerns about associating with illegal gambling
- Michigan Gaming Control Board, July
- Nevada Council on Problem Gambling, this summer
- Evergreen Council on Problem Gambling, Washington’s affiliate, Sept. 17, ending a 35-year relationship
The Massachusetts Gaming Commission has weighed its own exit, too. And the departures haven’t just come from members. Jaime Costello, NCPG’s director of programs, left the week before Maurer’s resignation was announced.
Here’s the bind for whoever takes the job next.
On Sept. 22, Longmeier published NCPG’s firmest position yet on prediction markets, saying “NCPG believes it is functionally gambling and can expose consumers to many of the same risks and harms associated with traditional gambling.”
Kalshi, meanwhile, remained a member, according to Axios. Kalshi spokesperson Elisabeth Diana told the outlet the company disagreed with NCPG’s assessment.
So the national problem gambling advocacy group calls prediction markets functionally gambling. And it still counts a prediction market operator as its top-tier member.
What happens next at NCPG
Maurer’s last day is Oct. 16. The board has not named an interim leader or a timeline for the search.
The next executive director inherits all of it. The Kalshi membership. The regulators who walked. A staff that has already lost at least one senior program leader.
As Costello wrote on LinkedIn when she left:
“The environment shifted in ways I could no longer reconcile with how I believe this work should be done.”
