December 14, 2020
New Senior Advisor, Vice President and Program Leaders to Lead Local, State, and Neighborhood Assistance
WASHINGTON, D.C. – December 8, 2020 — Today, the Center for Community Progress (Community Progress) announced new infrastructure changes and staff appointments to serve more communities through its technical assistance and place-based programs.
“Communities need us more now than ever,” said Dr. Akilah Watkins, President and CEO of Community Progress. “We’re growing and evolving to ensure we can meet these needs spurred by COVID-19, the growth of the land bank movement, and the long-standing challenges of vacancy and racial equity.”
As local leaders seek more effective ways to assess and address the drivers of systemic vacancy and implement equitable vacant property tools and strategies, Community Progress will combine its placed-based and technical assistance expertise to better meet community requests and needs.
The new operational change will unite the National Technical Assistance, Michigan Initiatives, and Georgia placed-based teams as an enhanced technical assistance division. The new division will continue the organization’s work delivering customized state-of-the-art technical assistance to local governments, state agencies, and neighborhood stakeholders across the country.
Since 2010, Community Progress has served more than 300 communities in 35 states through its National Technical Assistance program and place-based programs in Michigan and Georgia.
That work will continue under shared leadership with Danielle Lewinski as the new Vice President of Technical Assistance. To support the infrastructure changes, the new Technical Assistance will be enhanced with additional leadership changes that include:
For more information on the Community Progress team visit https://www.communityprogress.net/staff-pages-25.php
For interviews or more information on Community Progress and its National Technical Assistance Services, email media@communityprogress.net or call (877) 542-4842.
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Founded in 2010, the Center for Community Progress is the national leader for building strong, equitable communities where vacant, abandoned, and deteriorated properties are transformed into assets for neighbors and neighborhoods. Today, Community Progress has affected change in more than 48 states and seven countries through leadership education and collaborative systems, policy, and practice reforms. Simply, we work to transform “Vacant Spaces into Vibrant Places.” For more information, visit communityprogress.net.
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