Portia F. Graham is the Associate Director for Grants and Administration for the Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and Tracking (SMART) in the Office of Justice Programs (OJP). In this role, she assists the Director and staff in providing management and oversight of SMART Office grant programs, including the Adam Walsh Act Implementation Grant Program pursuant to the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act, the Comprehensive Approaches to Sex Offender Management Grant Program and the Dru Sjodin National Sex Offender Public Website.
Prior to joining SMART in 2018, Portia was the director of the National Institute of Justice's (NIJ's) Office of Operations. As director of the Office of Operations from 2012–18, Portia oversaw the following: audit resolution and response, budget formulation and execution, compliance monitoring/risk management, conference cost reporting, data call management, grant forecasting/solicitation management, non-grants administration (contracts and reimbursable agreements), peer review management, reception center management/general support services, records management, simplified acquisitions (purchase card) management and training development and delivery.
Portia joined NIJ as a Scientific, Engineering and Technical Assistance contractor in 2002, joining the federal workforce in July 2004 as a program operations specialist in NIJ's Office of Science and Technology. In 2008, Portia was selected as the Associate Director, Grants and Administration for NIJ's Planning, Budget, Management and Administration division, under the Office of the Director, which eventually became the Office of Operations.
Before joining OJP, Portia managed the convention and conference programs for the National Mining Association, a trade association. As part of a project team, she helped to produce a quadrennial trade show and conference with more than 35,000 attendees.
The daughter of a Foreign Service officer, Portia has lived throughout the world, including posts in Okinawa (where she was born), Liberia and Morocco (where she graduated from high school). She received an A.B. in government from Colby College, Waterville, Maine.