Ms. Gale
Cincotta
Executive Director, National Training
Information Center
view
testimony
Mr.
Scott Bernstein
President, Center for Neighborhood
Technology
view
testimony
Mr.
John Donahue
Executive Director, Coalition for the
Homeless
view
testimony
Ms.
MarySue Barrett
President, Metropolitan Planning Council
view
testimony
The Honorable Richard M. Daley
A biography of Mayor Daley is available on the City of Chicago Web site.
Mr. Jack Markowski
The Chicago Department of Housing is a 200-person city agency
whose mission is to advance the city’s goal for strengthening the
city by developing, revitalizing, and stabilizing neighborhoods.
Since 1980 the department has served as a center of affordable
housing innovation and community transformation.
From 1992 to 1997, Mr. Markowski served as Deputy Commissioner
for the Developer Services Division, where he managed all of the
department’s services to professional developers of affordable
housing. This included programs for the rehabilitation and new
construction of rental housing and for the new construction of
owner-occupied, single-family homes. Under his supervision, the
Chicago Department of Housing annually allocated $3.5 million in Low
Income Housing Tax Credits and $50 million in secondary financing
for the development of affordable housing in Chicago. In 1997, Mr.
Markowski was promoted to First Deputy Commissioner of the
Department of Housing.
Mr. Markowski’s career has included extensive experience with
housing and community development. Prior to joining the Chicago
Department of Housing, he served as the first Executive Director for
the North West Housing Partnership, an organization formed to
increase the supply of moderate-income housing in Chicago’s north
and northwest suburbs.
From 1981 to 1990, he was Executive Director of the Edgewater
Community Council, a community-based organization focusing on the
strategic revitalization of this diverse north side neighborhood.
Under Mr. Markowski’s direction, the Edgewater Community Council’s
successful redevelopment of the Winthrop-Kenmore residential and
commercial corridor stimulated more than $50 million in investments
and rehabilitation of 3,000 units of housing, thus reversing the
cycle of decline and disinvestment in this densely populated Chicago
neighborhood.
Mr. Markowski holds a Bachelor’s degree from the University of
Chicago and a Master’s degree in Urban and Regional Planning from
the University of Oregon. He has participated on numerous city,
state, and philanthropic committees related to housing and community
development in Chicago and throughout the United States.
Ms. Karen Przypyszny
Ms. Przypyszny, 43, is Senior Vice President of Acquisitions at
National Equity Fund, Inc., the nation’s largest nonprofit
syndicator of low-income housing tax credits. Prior to joining NEF,
Inc., in 2000, she was Senior Vice President of Equity and Lending
at Banc One Community Development Corporation, overseeing production
in 15 markets. From 1989 to 1997 she worked in various capacities at
Enterprise Social Investment Corporation, assisting in and managing
state and local equity funds, and managing investments in the
Southeast region. She has also served as an underwriter with the
Illinois Housing Development Corporation and the City of Chicago
Department of Housing. She graduated from the College of William and
Mary in Virginia and received a Master’s degree in Urban and
Regional Planning from the University of Illinois at
Champaign-Urbana in 1982.
Mr. David K. Hill, Jr.
David K. Hill, Jr., Chairman and CEO of Kimball Hill Homes,
graduated from Princeton University magna cum laude and with
honors from Northwestern University Law School. After law practice
in Chicago, he served in the Pentagon with the Navy on special cases
and strategic planning. He returned to Chicago in 1969 and founded
Kimball Hill Homes, which has since grown to be one of the 24
largest national homebuilders with current operations in 12 markets
throughout eight states.
Mr. Hill has served as President of the Home Builders Association
of Greater Chicago, as well as a Senior Officer for the Homebuilders
Association of Illinois. He has also served extensively as a member
of the NAHB Executive Committee, has been Chairman of the NAHB Task
Force on Unmet Housing Needs and its Mortgage Roundtable, and
continues as an active member of several NAHB Committees. Over seven
years, Mr. Hill served as Vice Chairman of the AFL-CIO Housing
Investment Trust and also served for a number of years on the
Federal Home Loan Bank of Chicago Board. He remains active as well
in a number of other local, regional, and national planning,
affordable housing, and charitable organizations, including the
North West Housing Partnership, 2020 Northwest, and the Harvard
Joint Center for Housing and the National Center for Housing Policy.
Mr. Peter R. Dwars
Now in his second term as executive director of the Illinois
Housing Development Authority (IHDA), Peter R. Dwars began his
career at IHDA in 1972 as a Mortgage Credit Administrator. By 1988
when he was named IHDA Director for the first time, Dwars had also
served as Deputy Director and, on three occasions, as Acting
Director.
Between 1994 and his reappointment as Executive Director by the
IHDA Board of Directors on January 17, 2000, Dwars worked for two
investment banking firms (CS First Boston and Alex Brown & Sons)
and the Chicago real estate firm of Jos. Cacciatore & Co. In all
three private sector positions, he worked on affordable housing
financing.
A Chicago resident, Dwars was secretary of the National Council
of State Housing Agencies when he left IHDA in 1994. He has also
served as Chairman of the Illinois Affordable Housing Trust Fund, as
a board member of the Chicago Local Initiatives Support Corp. and
the Chicago Housing Partnership, and as a member of the Government
Finance Officers Association.
Dwars, 50, earned his Master of Business Administration degree
from Loyola University of Chicago. He also holds a Bachelor’s degree
in Marketing and Economics from Indiana University in Bloomington.
Mr. Hipolito Roldan
As Chief Executive Officer of Hispanic Housing Development
Corporation, Mr. Roldan has developed over 1,700 affordable
apartments and townhomes in 20 various developments for families and
elderly residents of several Hispanic communities in Chicago. In
addition, he has initiated the development of over 80,000 square
feet of retail and office space in five Chicago-based developments.
He has also directed the formation of a property management arm,
which currently manages almost 3,400 residential units in various
communities throughout Chicago and Illinois. Mr. Roldan also
organized, established, and now directs Tropic Construction Corp., a
residential and commercial builder. Previous to his experience with
Hispanic Housing, Mr. Roldan also developed low-income housing in
Brooklyn, New York.
In 1988, Mr. Roldan was awarded a John D. and Catherine T.
MacArthur Foundation Fellowship for his work in Community
Development. He committed $100,000 of his Fellowship award for the
establishment of the Teresa & Hipolito Roldan Community
Development Scholarship Fund in order to attract Latinos into the
community development field. He is a decorated combat veteran of
Vietnam and holds a Bachelor’s degree in Social Studies from St.
Francis College, and a Master’s degree in Urban Studies from Long
Island University in New York.
Mr. Roldan also serves on various boards and committees including
the National and Chicago boards of the Local Initiatives Support
Corporation, National Puerto Rican Coalition, Division Street
Business Development Association, Chicago United, Latinos United,
Manufacturer’s Bank, The Retail Initiative (TRI), Chicago Transit
Authority Citizens Advisory Board, Futures Forum sponsored by Local
Initiatives Support Corp., and Chicago Forum on Housing Solutions.
Mr. Roldan was a participant in President Clinton’s Economic
Conferences held in Little Rock in 1992, and in Columbus, Ohio in
1995.
Mr. Daniel Burke
Daniel Burke is an attorney with over twelve years experience as
an affordable housing developer specializing in the preservation of
at-risk HUD-assisted housing. Mr. Burke received his Bachelor’s
degree from Georgetown University in 1978 and a law degree from
Loyola University of Chicago in 1984. Mr. Burke was a member of the
Loyola University of Chicago Law Journal and published an
article on the subject of municipal regulation of landlord and
tenant law.
From 1984 to 1988 Mr. Burke was employed as a staff attorney for
the Legal Assistance Foundation of Chicago. Mr. Burke specialized in
representing not-for-profit community groups and in representing
residents of HUD-assisted properties in class action lawsuits
regarding preservation of their homes.
In 1987 Mr. Burke served as Chief-of-Staff for Alderman Luis V.
Gutierrez of the 26th Ward in Chicago, Illinois. Mr. Burke was
responsible for legislative drafting and analysis, supervision of
constituent services, and relations with the Mayor’s Office and
administrative offices of the City of Chicago.
Mr. Burke has served as Vice President for Development of CCDC
since 1988. In this capacity he has been involved in the acquisition
and rehabilitation of CCDC’s portfolio of 1,650 HUD-assisted
apartments, of which 1,000 are assisted under the project-based
Section 8 program. In addition, Mr. Burke has served as a
development consultant to resident council and non-profit purchasers
of 20 properties containing 5,000 apartments in Illinois and
Wisconsin under HUD’s Preservation Program.
Mr. Burke is active in civic affairs and is a founding member of
the Board of Directors of the REST emergency shelter and the
Lakefront SRO Corporation. He currently serves as a Commissioner of
the Oak Park Housing Authority. Mr. Burke has served as a guest
speaker on low-income housing issues for a number of national and
local organizations including the National Housing Trust, the
National Alliance of HUD Tenants, the National Council of State
Housing Finance Agencies, and the National Leased Housing
Association. In 1997 he served on HUD’s Portfolio Re-Engineering
Working Group.
Mr. Terry Peterson
Terry Peterson brings a lifelong commitment to public service and
a deep love of his native Chicago to the job of Chief Executive
Officer of the Chicago Housing Authority. Born on the South Side of
Chicago, he spent his early years in the care of his grandparents in
Tennessee. He returned to Chicago and attended Englewood High
school. He later earned a Bachelor’s degree from Chicago State and a
Master’s Degree in Public Administration from Roosevelt University.
As Chief of Staff in the 17th Ward Alderman’s office from 1990
through 1994, Terry addressed the full range of neighborhood issues
from crime to housing to development, representing the alderman at
block club and community meetings and drafting proposals for the
City Council.
Terry spent one year as an Assistant Commissioner in the Chicago
Department of Planning and Development before taking a top position
in the office of Mayor Richard M. Daley, where he oversaw
redevelopment initiatives surrounding the Cabrini-Green and Henry
Horner public housing developments. Terry embraced the Mayor’s
vision of holistic community development built with public-private
partnerships and anchored by major investments in parks, schools,
libraries, police stations, and shopping centers.
Terry took this model of development back to the 17th Ward when
the mayor appointed him as 17th Ward Alderman to fill a vacancy. In
a special election he won 80 percent of the vote and ran unopposed
for reelection in 1999. In City Council, Terry served on eight
committees overseeing a range of issues from ethics to traffic,
finance, special events, parks and recreation, and human relations.
On June 1, 1999, Mayor Daley picked Terry Peterson to oversee the
Chicago Housing Authority’s bold, five-year $1.5 billion Plan for
Transformation, which was approved by the federal Department of
Housing and Urban Development in February 2000. Following approval
of his appointment as CEO by the CHA Board of Commissioners, Terry
has moved quickly to build on the efforts of his predecessors Joe
Shuldiner and Phillip Jackson to improve the quality of life for CHA
families, children, and seniors; to provide every lease-compliant
resident of public housing with a decent, safe home; and to turn the
Chicago Housing Authority into a national model of partnership,
progress, and promise.
Mr. David Saltzman
David M. Saltzman is Deputy Commissioner of Special Finance, City
of Chicago Department of Housing (DOH). Mr. Saltzman has been with
the Department for six years and oversees its multifamily loan
portfolio, and administers both the single family and multifamily
Tax Exempt Bond programs, the Low Income Housing Tax Credit program,
and the City’s participation in the Mark-to-Market program. He
served as Vice President for Merriam/Zuba Ltd., a residential real
estate development firm, and was also Project Development Manager
for PRIDE, a development organization based in the Austin community
on the west side of Chicago. He holds a Bachelor’s degree from Duke
University, and a Master’s of Management degree form J. L. Kellogg
Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University.
Francis Cardinal George, O.M.I.
A biography of Francis Cardinal George is available on the Web site of the Archdiocese of Chicago.
Mr. John Lukehart
Education
Iowa State University: Bachelor’s degree in Liberal
Arts
University of Illinois, Chicago: Post graduate work in Urban
Policy and Planning
Work Experience (1981 to present)
Leadership Council for Metropolitan Open Communities (http://www.lcmoc.org/), a
nationally recognized, Chicago area fair housing organization, which
operates enforcement, education, counseling, and advocacy programs,
with a staff of 35 people. Advanced to current position as Vice
President after serving as the director of community relations.
Responsible for program development and administration of the
Council’s community relations, public policy (including research),
and housing industry initiatives programs.
Concerning Fair Housing Planning: Since 1985 have reviewed and
commented on fair housing action plans submitted to Cook County by
municipal CDBG sub-grantees. In 1997, together with the University
of Illinois, prepared the State of Illinois’ “Analysis of Fair
Housing Impediments.” Have periodically provided input to fair
housing planning conducted by other Entitlement jurisdictions. In
1991, provided technical assistance to the Northeastern Illinois
Planning Commission in its development of a model fair housing
ordinance.
Recently supervised the preparation of a major report for the
Leadership Council, Black, White, and Shades of Brown: Fair
Housing and Economic Opportunity in the Chicago Region, authored
by Phil Nyden, Loyola University Chicago, and Bill Peterman, Chicago
State University.
In 1995 co-directed a research project with the Policy Research
Action Group, a Chicago-based consortium of university researchers
and community activists, to study the success of 14 diverse urban
neighborhoods in nine U.S. cities. This report was published in
summary form by the Fannie Mae Foundation’s Housing Policy
Debate in 1997 and in its entirety in Cityscape, HUD’s
policy journal, as “Racially and Ethnically Diverse Urban
Neighborhoods” (Vol. 4, No. 2) in 1998.
Authored a case study, Collaborative, Policy-Related Research
in the Area of Fair Housing and Community Development in Finding
Community: Social Science in Action, published by Pine Forge
Press in 1997.
Previously, worked as a union representative, teacher, and
co-editor of a community newspaper.
Volunteer Experience
Community activist in Oak Park, Illinois (nationally recognized
for its diversity programming); Chaired the Village’s Community
Relations Commission for four years in the mid-80s; served as a
member of the Village’s Citizens’ Police Review Committee in
1989/1990; served as president of a non-partisan, “political”
organization that slates candidates for village board election, from
1991 through 1993; managed successful village board and school board
election campaigns; and, in 1999, served on the Citizens Committee
on Library Space Needs. Currently a member of the Board of Directors
of the Oak Park Area Arts Council.
Mr. William T. Riley
William T. Riley has served as the Executive Director of CHAC,
the Chicago Section 8 Housing Program, since February 1996. With
over 25 years of housing program management experience, he began his
housing career in 1974 with the implementation of a local housing
repair loan and grant program, funded through the HUD Community
Development Block Grant. He has served in a variety of high-profile
management positions at the local and state level in Massachusetts,
including the senior position of Assistant Administrator of the
Boston Housing Authority with responsibility over the Section 8 and
state funded housing programs. He also served on a national task
force to assist in the implementation of an integrated Federal
Financial System for the Section 8 Housing Program. He currently
serves on the Executive Board of the Illinois chapter of the
National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials as its
Vice President of Professional Development.
In October 1994, he became on-site Manager of Washington DC–based
Quadel Consulting Corporation’s work in Moscow, Russia. The purpose
of this assignment was to oversee the implementation of a United
States Agency for International Development (USAID)–sponsored
Military Housing Voucher Program within several cities in western
Russia. He returned to the U.S. in December 1995 to prepare for his
relocation to Chicago.
Ms. Joy Aruguete
Ms. Aruguete has served as the Executive Director of Bickerdike
Redevelopment Corp. for the past six years. In this capacity, she
supervises the operation of this 33-year-old not-for-profit
community development corporation. Bickerdike is dedicated to
community-controlled development, the preservation and management of
affordable housing, and economic development efforts geared toward
job creation. Ms. Aruguete oversees the work of 65 staff members who
carry out Bickerdike’s mission. This work has included the
development of 871 housing units, including 128 single-family homes;
the management of 807 rental units; the abatement of lead hazard in
over 100 units; the performance of minor repairs in over 500
households; the development of hundreds of jobs for community
residents; and, most importantly, the development of hundreds of
community leaders.
She also supervises the work of Humboldt Construction Company,
which is a 20-year-old wholly owned for-profit subsidiary of
Bickerdike Redevelopment Corp. Humboldt Construction Company’s
specific goal is job creation for local residents. The company
provides general contracting services and quality construction
through a team of over 20 carpenters who are members of the
Carpenters Union Local 13.
Ms. Aruguete also serves as the President of the Chicago Rehab
Network; this organization’s membership includes Chicago
community-based not-for-profit housing groups engaged in the
revitalization of Chicago’s neighborhoods. At the Chicago Rehab
Network she provides leadership in efforts to guarantee the capacity
and effective work of community development corporations. She has
played a role in generating policy initiatives, designed to bring
more creative resources in the development of quality affordable
housing in Chicago.
Ms. Aruguete also serves as a mayoral appointee to the City’s
Community Development Advisory Committee (CDAC) and is currently
Co-Chair of the Housing Sub-Committee of CDAC. She has played a role
at the national level in bringing more capacity and resources to
community development work through her efforts sponsored by the
Center for Community Change.
Her work at Bickerdike and the Chicago Rehab Network has added to
her background in community organizing and economic development,
which she gained through seven years of development work in Central
America, and from her dedication to the utilization of a base-up
model of planning and development. Currently, her experience is
enriched by three years of teaching in the Urban Developers Program
at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Prior to this, she taught
for two years at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Ms. Aruguete
received her Master’s degree from the University of
Wisconsin-Madison. She also holds two Bachelor’s degrees from that
same institution, a Certificate in Non-Profit Management from
Roosevelt University, and an Illinois Real Estate Broker License.
She has been active in the not-for-profit world for over 19 years.
Mr. Bruce A. Gottschall
Bruce A. Gottschall is the Executive Director of Neighborhood
Housing Services of Chicago (NHS), the largest NHS program in the
nation. He has been the director since its founding in 1975 and
worked with the Urban Reinvestment Task Force to develop the Chicago
NHS program. Prior to that he was an organizer with the Erie
Neighborhood House, Executive Director of the Bickerdike
Redevelopment Corporation, and served in the Peace Corps in Lima,
Peru. He has a Bachelor’s degree in Sociology from Dartmouth College
and a Master’s degree in Social Service Administration from the
University of Chicago.
Neighborhood Housing Services of Chicago is Chicago’s largest
community development organization. This partnership of business,
government, and neighborhood residents launched three neighborhood
programs in 1975. To date, NHS has operated 19 neighborhood programs
(including seven neighborhood programs where it has phased out
services): Auburn Gresham/Englewood; Back of the Yards; Central
Austin; Chicago Lawn/Gage Park; East Garfield Park; Garfield
Boulevard; Heart of Chicago; Marshall Square/Douglas Park; Martin
Luther King, Jr., Drive; Little Village; Near Northwest; North
Lawndale; Pilsen; Roseland; South Chicago; the Southwest Lending
Resource Center; West Englewood; and two areas of West Humboldt
Park. They are all low- and moderate-income neighborhoods with
predominately minority populations.
NHS uses it resources as a catalyst to stimulate reinvestment and
restore confidence. Local offices offer rehabilitation and loan
assistance, insurance and financial counseling, and advocacy with
City departments and housing courts. NHS has established two
subsidiaries to enhance the resources and tools available to restore
neighborhood confidence. They are the NHS Redevelopment Corporation,
which acquires and redevelops problem properties, develops new
multi-family rental properties, and owns and manages 334 units of
rehabbed low-income rental apartments; and Neighborhood Lending
Services, which administers several purchase and rehab loan programs
that serve low- and moderate-income neighborhoods citywide. In the
25 years since it was founded, NHS has served more than 123,000
clients, rehabilitated or built 21,310 units of housing, and
generated over $1 billion of reinvestment in Chicago’s
neighborhoods.
Mr. Gottschall’s expertise in the fields of housing and community
development has led to service on a number of committees and
commissions, including the City of Chicago Five Year Affordable
Housing Plan Advisory Board and Steering Committee, the Federal Home
Loan Bank Advisory Committee, and Mayor Daley’s Blue Ribbon
Committee on Abandoned Property. He chairs Chicago’s Comprehensive
Housing Affordability Strategy Advisory Committee and is currently
Co-chair of the National NeighborWorks® Campaign for Home Ownership
2002 of the Neighborhood Reinvestment Corporation.
A life-long resident of Chicago, Mr. Gottschall lives with his
family in the city’s Hyde Park neighborhood.
Mr. Richard Townsell
Richard Townsell was born on Chicago’s westside in the community
of North Lawndale and currently resides a few blocks from where he
was born. After graduating from Northwestern University with a
degree in Secondary Math Education, he came back to the community
and taught at Collins High School by day and ran after-school
enrichment programs at Lawndale Community Church for local
elementary school students. After teaching for one year in Chicago
Public Schools, he desired to learn and grow by teaching in a
suburban school setting and was hired to teach Math at Evanston
Township High School. Teaching at Evanston also allowed Richard to
stay close to Northwestern University, where he trained for the 1992
Olympics in wrestling. After placing in the top six in the nation at
his weight class at the Nationals and representing the United States
internationally, Richard retired from competition to pursue a
different calling. After seeing firsthand the disparities between
rich and poor school districts, Richard decided to take a job at his
local church, Lawndale Community Church, as the Executive Director
of Lawndale Christian Development Corporation (LCDC).
Under Richard’s 8-year tenure as the Executive Director of LCDC,
the organization and the community have seen tremendous growth. LCDC
has helped many first time homeowners to be educated about the
process of owning their own home and has helped many to realize the
dream of homeownership. To date, LCDC has completed and sold 55
units with a total development cost of over $3.5 million. LCDC has
also completed the first newly constructed single family home in the
target area in decades and has plans to construct another 25 to 30
in the spring of 2001. Lazarus Apartments, a $3.5 million renovation
of two buildings that were abandoned for 15 years, was completed in
February of 1996 and has given 48 families the opportunity to live
in brand new, fully rehabbed, energy-efficient apartments.
Additionally, LCDC is currently rehabbing Tabernacle Apartments, a
26-unit rental development with an approximate development cost of
$3.1 million. LCDC owns and manages a total of 110 units for
families in North Lawndale. All of the apartments have rents that
are very affordable for families in the community. A $3.1 million
daycare facility will be completed in the year 2000 in a partnership
with The Resurrection Project and the Illinois Facilities Fund. This
facility will be new construction and serve 250 children and employ
approximately 50 people. Empowerment Zone funds have been leveraged
for this project.
LCDC in a partnership with NHS of Chicago has loaned over $5
million since 1993 to residents in the community to purchase and
renovate homes. Twenty students have been mentored and provided
college scholarships because of LCDC’s College Opportunity Program,
and there are currently 30 high school students that are slated to
go college that are being assisted by full-time coordinators. These
coordinators work with these students for five years to prepare them
for college. LCDC has helped to open one of Chicago’s finest pizza
chains in the North Lawndale community. Lou Malnati’s restaurant
opened in November of 1995 and employs many community residents.
Finally, LCDC was the recipient of the fifth SNAPP award from the
City of Chicago, Department of Planning and Development. This award
will generate over $3 million dollars in reinvestment in the North
Lawndale community for housing, infrastructure improvements, parks,
and business retention programs.
Richard has a Master’s degree in urban housing development from
Spertus College in Chicago and a certificate in Business
Administration from the University of Illinois at Chicago’s Business
School. He is also an adjunct faculty member of Northwestern
University, Wheaton College, and the University of Illinois at
Chicago and focuses his teaching on how to organize communities
around their assets versus their liabilities. Richard is also a
Fellow with Leadership Greater Chicago.
Richard is most proud of his two brothers, who are also college
graduates. He has been married to his college sweetheart, Stephanie,
for ten years and has a five-year-old daughter, Lena, and a
three-year-old son, Gabriel. Richard is very active as a deacon at
Lawndale Community Church as well as a board member of several
community organizations.
Ms. Gale Cincotta
Gale Cincotta is nationally known for having spearheaded the
neighborhood movement. She is co-founder and serves as Executive
Director of the National Training and Information Center (1973 to
present), a resource center on urban issues that has brought to
national attention such issues as mortgage and insurance redlining,
Federal Housing Administration abuses, and community-level drug
prevention.
Ms. Cincotta led the fight to pass the Home Mortgage Disclosure
Act in 1976 and the Community Reinvestment Act in 1977. These laws
have helped neighborhood organizations leverage billions of dollars
into underserved communities.
President Carter appointed Ms. Cincotta to the national
Commission on Neighborhood where she chaired the Reinvestment Task
Force. In 1990, NTIC’s work on community-based anti-drug initiatives
was recognized by President Bush.
During the late 1990s Ms. Cincotta led the way as community
groups from around the country won national reforms to the Federal
Housing Administration’s home loan program. These reforms were
designed to prevent fraud and abuse and ultimately foreclosures and
abandonment. Most recently, Ms. Cincotta and neighborhood groups
throughout Chicago passed the first city ordinance designed to
prevent predatory lending practices.
Ms. Cincotta is also chairperson of National People’s Action
(1972 to present), a coalition of over 300 neighborhood groups
nationwide.
Mr. Scott Bernstein
Scott Bernstein is President of the Center for Neighborhood
Technology (CNT), which develops resources to promote healthy,
sustainable communities; and publisher of The Neighborhood
Works, winner of the Peter Lisagor Award for Public Service
Journalism. Other publications include Sustainable Manufacturing:
Saving Jobs, Saving the Environment; School Reform Chicago
Style; and Working Neighborhoods: Taking Charge of Your Local
Economy; among others.
A native Chicagoan, Bernstein studied engineering and political
science at Northwestern University and served on the staff of its
Center for Urban Affairs & Policy Research. He has been a
Visiting Lecturer at UCLA, an Environmental Fellow of the Institute
for Transportation Studies at UC–Davis, a trustee of the Institute
for the Regional Community, and a board member of The Brookings
Institution Center for Urban & Metropolitan Policy. He is a
founding board member of both the Surface Transportation Policy
Project and Smart Growth America. He also serves as a board member
of the State and Local Public Policy Program at the Hubert Humphrey
Institute and Imagine Chicago, and is a fellow of the Center for
Small Business and the Environment.
Mr. Bernstein was appointed by President Clinton to the
President’s Council for Sustainable Development, on which he served
as the co-chair of task forces on State, Local & Regional
Initiatives and the Metropolitan Strategies Working Group. He also
chaired a working group on Cross-Cutting Climate Issues intended to
specify a U.S. domestic strategy.
CNT has spent the last twenty years analyzing the relationships
between regionally scaled economic and political systems and the
status of communities within these regions. Demonstration work in
the 1980s in the fields of housing abandonment prevention, energy
efficiency, pollution prevention, storm water management, and
recycling helped fuel a generation of community development
institutions and learning.
In community development, CNT co-convened a working group of
civic and community leaders to prevent housing abandonment. Their
recommendations led to the creation of community equity funds and
housing finance partnerships that became the dominant method of
community housing finance nationally, and led to an increase by
approximately 2,000 in the number of community development
corporations.
In information technology, CNT’s Neighborhood Early Warning
System (NEWS) has provided critical right-to-know data to
disadvantaged communities seeking responsible reinvestment. NEWS has
become the core of a network of over 70 organizations using this
system to achieve affirmative access to the “information
superhighway.” The NEWS approach has been emulated from Los Angeles
to New Haven (see http://www.newschicago.org/).
Mr. Bernstein is currently Secretary of the Institute for Location
Efficiency, which works to have bank underwriting fairly reflect the
benefits of transit-based communities as a way of recognizing their
cost-of-living advantages for first-time home buyers, and as a path
to poverty alleviation (see http://www.locationefficiency.com/).
Recently, this had led to a $125 Million commitment by the Federal
National Mortgage Association to demonstrate this program in
Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Seattle.
In transportation and air quality, CNT was the first organization
to demonstrate the joint air quality and economic benefits of
transit-oriented design around existing inner-city rapid transit
stations. This work led to decisions by the Chicago Transit
Authority to rebuild Chicago’s oldest elevated line, the Green Line,
and the City of Chicago subsequently crafted its winning empowerment
zone strategy around the resulting community-based station plans.
Bernstein is a co-founding Board member of the Surface
Transportation Policy Project, a national coalition working for
progressive national transportation policy. And he convened the
Chicagoland Transportation and Air Quality Commission, a coalition
involving hundreds of organizations and municipalities created to
“bring home the benefits of transportation reform to our region’s
communities.” For its efforts to link transportation efficiency with
community improvement, CNT was awarded the first “Mobility Partners”
award by USEPA at the White House Conference on Climate Change, and
was recognized with the national award for transportation efficiency
by Renew America in 1996.
In community energy initiatives, CNT secured investment and
facilitated energy retrofitting in over 1,000 Chicago facilities,
ranging from community centers to low income housing to the Sears
Tower. Its own building was rated the most energy efficient adaptive
reuse in Illinois by a leading engineering society, and was
Illinois’ first intentionally non-toxic work place. Mr. Bernstein
has advised the last four Mayors of Chicago on energy,
environmental, and economic development policy and programs. CNT
recently formed a strategic planning partnership with the
Commonwealth Edison Company to identify the benefits of place-based
investment to the future of the company, its customers, and its
serviced communities (see http://www.energycooperative.net/).
This includes perhaps the first systematic analysis in the nation of
the stakes of utilities in “smart growth.” CNT this year will also
develop a new approach to identifying new ways to specify
market-based strategies for emissions reductions that recognize that
a large number of small sources can count more than a small number
of large ones.
In environment, materials, and manufacturing, CNT co-convened the
new “Wet Cleaning Partnership” to facilitate the transition of the
commercial cleaning industry from hazardous solvents to water-based
environment-friendly technology. Earlier, in the late 1980s,
Bernstein conceived of and launched the Sustainable Manufacturing
program to provide strategically important financial and technical
assistance to the nation’s metal finishing industry. This
partnership earned both the coveted Renew America Environmental
Leadership Award and the National Association of Metal Finishers
Special Merit Award, and is featured in the January 1993 issue of
Audubon magazine. Mr. Bernstein is co-convener of the
Alliance for a Sustainable Materials Economy, a national coalition
working for a materials reuse policy to both protects the
environment and support job opportunities.
In regional economic strategy, with Julia Parzen, he organized an
Urban Sustainability Learning Group to identify principles for
collective efficacy and comprehensive regional performance. This
work helped specify the Metropolitan Initiative, supported by
foundations and inspired by the PCSD to re-craft the relationship
between the federal government and local regions. In 1997–98, the
program engaged 1,000 civic leaders in twelve urban regions to
address the possibilities and identified new strategies for building
effective partnerships to take advantage of both policy changes and
market rules; findings are posted at www.cnt.org/mi. More recently, the
creation of a Partnership for Regional Livability resulted from this
work—PRL is a network of regional initiatives in Atlanta, the Bay
Area, Chicago, and Denver seeking to build inclusive, high
performance solutions to urban metropolitan challenges. The work
includes strategies to address air quality, workforce,
transportation, investment, and information economy opportunities
(see http://www.prlonline.org/).
Mr. Bernstein is involved in an advisory capacity to the Federal
government on a variety of issues; current assignments include:
National Academy of Sciences / National Research Council,
Committee on Industrial Competitiveness and Environmental
Protection; National Science Foundation, Human Capital
Initiative Advisory Committee; Office of Technology Assessment,
United States Congress, Study Assessment on Cities, Technology
and Infrastructure; President’s Council on Sustainable
Development, Task Forces on Eco-Efficiency and Sustainable
Communities; Transportation Research Board, Committee on
Transportation Investment & Economic Productivity; Office of
the President, Policy Dialogue on Reducing Greenhouse Gas
Emissions from Personal Motor Vehicles (a.k.a. “Car Talk”) and
National Homeownership Partnership Initiative.
CNT’s and Mr. Bernstein’s work has earned recognition awards from
the American Society of Landscape Architects; Renew America; the
Enterprise Foundation; People for Community Recovery; the Governor
of Illinois; the U.S. Secretary of Energy; the League of Women
Voters; the National Information Infrastructure, and Utne
Reader, among others.
His current interests include: (1) Making regional smart growth
real with targeted demonstrations in Chicago and South Florida; (2)
developing market-based approaches to regional economic and
environmental performance that “bring home the benefits of
sustainable development where they can do the most good,” including
homeownership and asset development, air and water quality, and job
development as priorities; (3) application of least-cost approaches
to materials policy, environmental restoration, transportation and
air quality, and job creation; (4) creating an agenda of convergence
between environmental, industrial, and neighborhood development
policy; launching of new intermediary institutions that support
neighborhood job creation through environmentally driven investment;
and (5) development of initiatives to combat global warming through
“local cooling.” These interests are covered in a new publication,
The Hidden Assets of Cities, forthcoming. Mr. Bernstein is
48, and he and his wife, Christine Imhoff, live in Chicago’s Rogers
Park neighborhood with their daughters, Serena and Rebecca, where
they are active in community affairs.
Mr. John Donahue
John Donahue is the Director of the Chicago Coalition for the
Homeless. He lived and worked in Panama for thirteen years
organizing cooperatives in Panama City. He spent three of those
years helping the indigenous people of the Darien Rain Forest
protect their habitat.
In Chicago Mr. Donahue worked for association House developing
employment and training programs. He also developed “Comite’
Latino,” a Latino community organization located in Uptown and
Rogers Park, advocating for housing and jobs.
Mr. Donahue has been with the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless
since 1990. The Chicago Coalition for the Homeless is founded on the
belief that decent, humane housing is a human right in a just
society and, to that end, is organized to research, create, and
implement programs to reverse the decline in low-income housing and
to address and alleviate the problem of homelessness within
metropolitan Chicago.
Ms. MarySue Barrett
MarySue Barrett is president of the Metropolitan Planning
Council, an independent, nonprofit group of business and civic
leaders working to achieve policies that enhance the vitality and
livability of the Chicago metropolitan region.
Ms. Barrett assumed the role of MPC President and board member on
April 1, 1996. During her tenure, MPC has dramatically increased its
advocacy work, launching “Business Leaders for Transportation, a
coalition representing more than 10,000 regional employers, and the
“Campaign for Sensible Growth,” which is promoting strategies to
achieve balanced development. In addition, MPC focuses on
transportation enhancements, property tax reform, housing near jobs,
and technology access.
Prior to joining MPC, Ms. Barrett served in Mayor Richard M.
Daley’s administration, holding positions of increasing
responsibility over seven years. In 1995, she was recruited to serve
as Chief of Staff to the Chicago School Reform Board of Trustees,
part of a new management team charged with bringing revolutionary
change to the Chicago Public Schools. From 1993 through 1995,
MarySue Barrett was Chief of Policy for Mayor Daley, where she
coordinated initiatives on public safety, economic and community
development, and lifelong education. Ms. Barrett began her municipal
government work in 1989 in the Mayor’s Office of Intergovernmental
Affairs and counts among her top governmental accomplishments
Chicago’s successful implementation of community policing and
neighborhood redevelopment projects. Ms. Barrett also spearheaded
the City of Chicago’s successful bid to host the 1996 Democratic
National Convention.
Ms. Barrett serves on the Illinois Growth Task Force, the
Advisory Boards of the Chicago Transit Authority, the Chicago
Convention and Tourism Bureau, and the Urban Land Institute’s Forum
on Balancing Land Use and Transportation.
MarySue Barrett enjoys her volunteer work with not-for-profit
organizations. She serves on the boards of the Committee on Foreign
Affairs of the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations and the Chicago
Network. Ms. Barrett also is a member of Northwestern University’s
Council of One Hundred, and the Economic Club of Chicago.
Ms. Barrett has a Bachelor’s degree from Northwestern University.
In 1995–96, she was one of 11 participants in the Leadership
Foundation Fellows program of the International Women’s Forum. She
completed the Leadership Greater Chicago program in 1994 and was
honored that same year as one of Crain’s Chicago Business “40
Under 40.” She, her husband, and her infant son live on the north
side of Chicago.
