Boris Johnson is setting up a high-profile board to encourage more London men to sign up as role models for disadvantaged teenage boys.
The Mayor’s beleaguered mentoring scheme has failed to recruit the numbers of volunteers he wanted.
But his team hopes the new board — which includes double Olympic gold medal rower Pete Reed — will be able to provide fresh momentum to the struggling project.
Mr Johnson’s mentoring czar Ray Lewis has also signed up former American NFL player Cecil Martin and hopes to recruit more members including women, ethnic minorities and a former police officer.
The Mayor hopes that eventually 10,000 young people will benefit from various schemes developed over the next year.
The board, which meets for the first time next month, will help boost publicity for mentoring as well as delivering programmes. Members include De Beers executive Andrew Bone, who has experience delivering complex World Health Organisation projects in Africa, and the chairman is likely to be a PR professional.
They will all be expected to act as ambassadors for the scheme, giving talks in schools and businesses to recruit more mentors and young people. Large companies will be encouraged to get staff involved.
A source close to the scheme said: “Ray believes that the Mayor’s mentoring programme is not going anywhere without something like this.
“We need people involved from all walks of life who are not part of the political system, so all they want to do is to deliver.” The board wants football stars to get involved. Mr Martin, who has volunteered since he was 17, said: “We believe Premier League footballers need to do more but it’s up to the players to want to do it.
“A lot of them will remember what got them to where they are, but sometimes you get caught up with things and you’re not in the frame of mind to give more.”
Mr Lewis told the Standard: "I do know that mentoring had a little bit of a rough start but since we had this new format, with local partners delivering services without an intermediary, it's been working well.
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"That's why now is a good time to look ahead and recruit lots more people, over and above the current mentoring scheme. These guys are top athletes and they have an almost magnetic attraction for young people who really love the concept of a coach.
"I don't want anything to go flat after the Olympics, I want to build on that. My job is to make sure mentoring remains on the Mayor's radar. I think I'm pushing on an open door.
"I suspect that in the past mentoring has been something of a Cinderella, though those of us directly involved know how powerful it can be. My job is to make sure that goes up a notch so not just those of us directly involved at City Hall, but also indirectly, realise that too."
