Barry Bluestone | David Soule | Joan Fitzgerald | Heather Seligman | Russell Williams | Bonnie Heudorfer | Stephanie Pollack | Don Walsh | Richard O'Bryant | Don Zizzi | Eleanor G. White | Anne Habiby | Shelley McDonough Kimelberg | Mary Huff Stevenson | Alan Clayton-Matthews | Joe Christo | Marc Horne | Lauren Nicoll | Chase Billingham | David Streim | Keisha Gayle-Luz | Eleni Himaras | Katja Schiller | Farid Faid Farid | Sarah Heim | Alexandra Curley

Barry Bluestone is the Stearns Trustee Professor of Political Economy, Director of the Center for Urban and Regional Policy, and Dean of the School of Social Science, Urban Affairs, and Public Policy at Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts. Before assuming these posts, Bluestone spent twelve years at the University of Massachusetts at Boston as the Frank L. Boyden Professor of Political Economy and as a Senior Fellow at the University's John W. McCormack Institute of Public Affairs. He was the Founding Director of U.Mass.-Boston's Ph.D. Program in Public Policy. Before coming to U.Mass. in the Fall of 1986, he taught economics at Boston College for fifteen years and was Director of the University's Social Welfare Research Institute. Professor Bluestone was raised in Detroit, Michigan and attended the University of Michigan where he received his Ph.D. in 1974.

On partial leave from U.Mass.-Boston in 1995, Bluestone served as a member of the senior policy staff of Congressman Richard Gephardt, the Democratic Leader of the U.S. House of Representatives.

As a political economist, Bluestone has written widely in the areas of income distribution, business and industrial policy, labor-management relations, higher education finance, and urban and regional economic development. He contributes regularly to academic, as well as popular journals, and is the author of nine books. In 1982, he published The Deindustrialization of America (co-authored with Bennett Harrison of the New School for Social Research) which analyzed the restructuring of American industry and its economic and social impact on workers and communities. A sequel published in 1988, The Great U-Turn: Corporate Restructuring and the Polarizing of America, also co-authored with Harrison, investigated how economic policies have contributed to growing inequality. In earlier books, Bluestone investigated the low-wage labor market, the aircraft industry, and the revolution in the retail trade sector. In 1992, Negotiating the Future: A Labor Perspective on American Business was published. Co-authored with his father, Irving Bluestone, the book traces the history of labor-management relations since World War II and offers the concept of the "Enterprise Compact" as an approach to industrial relations which can boost productivity, improve product quality and innovation, and enhance employment security. As of 1998, Korean, Spanish, and Japanese editions had been published.

Bluestone has also completed two newer books. The first of these, co-authored again with Harrison and titled Growing Prosperity: The Battle for Growth with Equity in the 21st Century, investigates the prospects for faster economic growth in the U.S. It was published by Houghton Mifflin and the Twentieth Century Fund in January 2000. The second, The Boston Renaissance: Race, Space, and Economic Change in an American Metropolis, published by the Russell Sage Foundation, is the culmination of nearly five years of research on the new Boston economy. It recounts the industrial and demographic revolution in post-World War II Boston and its impact on racial and ethnic attitudes, residential segregation, and the labor market success of whites, blacks, and Latinos.

As part of his work, Bluestone spends a considerable amount of time consulting with trade unions, with industry groups, and with various federal and state government agencies. He was Executive Adviser to the Governor's Commission on the Future of Mature Industries in Massachusetts and has worked with the economic development departments of various states. He has testified before Congressional committees and lectures regularly before university, labor, community, and business groups. As a founding member of the Nommos Consulting Group and working with Streamline Communications, he has been involved in the development of multimedia productions and CD-ROMs used in training sessions for labor/management groups and for public school teachers. Bluestone is also a founding member of the Economic Policy Institute, along with Robert Reich, Lester Thurow, Robert Kuttner, Ray Marshall, and Jeff Faux.

In his spare time, he competes in team triathlons as a bicycle racer -- fortunately with a team otherwise comprised of orthopedic surgeons and an internist. He lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts with his wife Mary Ellen Colten and their son Joshua.

David Soule

David Soule is Associate Director at the Center for Urban and Regional Policy at Northeastern University.

Prior to joining the Center, he stepped down as the Executive Director of the Metropolitan Area Planning Council after 15 + years of service. As the Chief Executive Officer of the Council, he was responsible for a budget which exceeded $8 million and a staff of more than 80 professional and support personnel. During his tenure, he oversaw the development of MetroPlan, a comprehensive plan for the future of the Boston metropolitan area.

In April 2003, Soule completed his Ph.D. in the Law, Policy, and Society program at Northeastern University. Prior to joining the Metropolitan Area Planning Council, Soule served as the Executive Director of the Nashua Regional Planning Commission in Nashua, New Hampshire for 7 years. From 1971 to 1980, he served as Deputy and Planning Director of the Capitol Region Council of Governments in Hartford, Connecticut.

Soule has a bachelor's degree from Trinity College and has done extensive graduate work in urban studies.

Joan Fitzgerald

Joan Fitzgerald is a Senior Research Associate at the Center for Urban and Regional Policy and Director of the Law, Policy, and Society program and at Northeastern University. Previously, Fitzgerald taught urban policy and public affairs at the New School University, the University of Illinois at Chicago, and Ohio State University.

Fitzgerald has written for a wide number of publications, including Economic Development Quarterly, Evaluation and Program Planning, Journal of Black Political Economy, and Urban Education. She has also written policy papers for the Brookings Institution, the Education Commission of the States, the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, and the Economic Development Assistance Corporation of Boston.

She published Implementing Economic Development in Cities and Suburbs (Sage) with Nancey Green Leigh in 2002. The book explores how social justice and environmental sustainability can be incorporated into urban and suburban economic development strategies. Fitzgerald completed another book in 2004, Moving up in the New Economy, an examination of the proliferation of low-wage jobs in strong economic times and a look at the effectiveness of labor market intermediaries in securing career advancement for workers. The book will be published in 2005. Funding for the research was provided by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Annie E. Casey Foundation, and the Century Foundation.

Fitzgerald received her B.A. (1979) and M.A. (1984) in sociology at Pennsylvania State University. She also received her Ph.D. at Pennsylvania State University in Community Systems Planning and Development (1988).

She lives in Boston with her husband, Robert Kuttner, a magazine editor, writer, and journalist. Her daughter, Shelly, lives in Englewood, New Jersey.

Heather Seligman

Seligman began her tenure at CURP in the fall of 2000. As our Associate Director of Administration and Finance, she is currently responsible for all grant financials, with annual funds over 2 million. Additionally, she is in charge of CURP operations, responsible for project management, budgeting, accounting, human resources, and payroll systems. She works closely with CURP Director Barry Bluestone on strategic planning and development for the Center. She also assists with marketing and manages many high-level events.

Seligman also serves as Chief Financial Officer for the School of Social Sciences, Urban Affairs, and Public Policy. Similar to her role for CURP, she functions in the same capacity, managing operations and projects for the School.

In May 2008, Seligman will complete her Masters in Business Administration. During the course of her academic experience, she discovered her interests lie in entrepreneurship, which is closely related to her current position and the attitudes of the Center. She currently lives near the water in Chelsea, MA which she shares with her yellow lab, Ivy. Seligman can be found frequently on her roofdeck entertaining friends in the summer, or cooking a great meal in her gourmet kitchen in the winter. She’s also a runner and a life-long student of ballet.

Russell Williams

Russell Williams is an economist whose areas of research include urban, labor and institutional economics. At CURP, he has served as a Senior Research Associate for several years. Williams received his Ph.D. in Economics at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, which he attended after winning a Ford Foundation Fellowship. In addition to his work at CURP, Williams is a professor at Wheaton College in Norton, Massachusetts, where he teaches courses in urban economics, the economics of education, the economics of race, and macroeconomics.

Williams' professional experience in economics includes previous positions with the U.S. Department of Labor in Washington, D.C., the Regional Institute for Employment Policy, Abt Associates, and the William Monroe Trotter Institute. He has contributed to a number of reports and studies, dealing with urban economic development, the changing demographic makeup of Greater Boston, workforce training, and youth programs in the inner city. His academic and professional work has used a wide range of methodologies, ranging from interviews and focus group facilitation, to statistical analysis techniques such as OLS, probit, and hazard analysis. His writings have been directed to a wide variety of audiences, from academicians to policy-makers to the general public.

Raised in Orangeburg, South Carolina, Williams received a National Achievement Scholarship for his undergraduate studies at Amherst College, where he received a B.A. in History. In college, he participated in several extracurricular activities, including the Amherst College Glee Club, the Afro-American Society, and the freshman basketball team. He was one of a small number of freshmen selected to join the Glee Club on a U.S. State Department-sponsored concert world tour to Japan, Korea, the Philippines, Taiwan, Thailand, Nepal, India, Iran, Lebanon, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Austria, and France. After college he moved to Washington, D.C. where he lived for two years before moving to Boston in 1974. Before beginning his Ph.D. studies, he took graduate courses in Economics at Northeastern University and Boston University.

In addition to his research, applied work, and teaching in economics, Williams' other professional experience includes nine years as Associate Director of the Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity, Inc., where he managed 20 professional staff and oversaw operations with a cash flow of $3 million; and consultant work for AHEAD, Inc., an international health and development organization. Williams has volunteered in several capacities, including service as a member of the Board of Managers of the New England Home for Little Wanderers, as a member of the Advisory Board of the New England Advanced Studies Program (an enrichment program for high school students), as co-chair of Operation Big Vote-Boston, and as a member and subcommittee chairperson on the United Way of Massachusetts-Bay Social Services Allocations Review Committee. He has been listed in Who' s Who in the East, and Who' s Who in American Education.

Williams has been a guest lecturer on numerous occasions addressing topics such as urban economics, economic inequality, and the economics of education. In 1996, he was a participant in a Children' s Defense Fund-sponsored national teleconference on the relationships between economic development and the needs of black children.

In his spare time, Williams enjoys music and watching sports. He is a lifelong pianist, whose pre-college training included studies at South Carolina State University and Peabody Institute of Music (Baltimore). As an adult he served for two years as accompanist for New England Conservatory' s Community Services Program voice class. Williams lives in Central Massachusetts.

Bonnie Heudorfer

Bonnie Heudorfer is an Independent Consultant, specializing in housing, strategic planning and community development. Her clients include financial institutions, municipalities and government agencies, academic institutions, and advocacy organizations. She provides a broad spectrum of services, including housing needs assessments, affordable housing plans and implementation strategies, program evaluations, survey research, and market analyses. In addition, she assists communities in the development of local and regional housing partnerships.

At CURP, Bonnie recently completed work on the Greater Boston Housing Report Card, a comprehensive annual assessment of the progress Greater Boston is making toward providing housing opportunities for all of its citizens. Previously, she had worked on the Weston Housing Survey and the previous Greater Boston Housing Report Cards. She was project manager and co-author of CURP’s first Greater Boston Housing Report Card in 2002.

Bonnie has also worked on many other projects, including, "Taking the Initiative: A Guidebook on Creating Local Affordable Housing Strategies," a comprehensive guidebook, commissioned by Citizens’ Housing and Planning Association and funded by the Massachusetts Housing Partnership, to provide assistance to communities attempting to expand their affordable housing options and "Massachusetts Housing Affordability Review: The Skyrocketing Costs of Homeownership in Massachusetts," a housing affordability gap analysis, by community, prepared for 2000-2002.

She has served as a consultant to CHAPA and the Governor’s Task Force on MGL Chapter 40B and a consultant to the Massachusetts Housing Partnership Fund and to a number of Massachusetts cities and towns.

Prior to establishing her own consulting practice in the spring of 2001, Bonnie was BankBoston’s Director of Community Reinvestment and Fair Lending, and before that, Director of Residential Development for the Boston Redevelopment Authority. She was the co-founder of the Women’s Institute for Housing and Economic Development and served as the first Executive Director of the Boston Housing Partnership. She serves on the board of directors and executive committee of Citizens’ Housing and Planning Association, of which she is a past president, and is the Chair of the Town of Harvard’s Housing Partnership. A graduate of the University of Connecticut, Bonnie received her master’s degree in City and Regional Planning from Pratt Institute.

Stephanie Pollack

Stephanie Pollack is a Senior Research Associate at the Center for Urban and Regional Policy and an adjunct professor at Northeastern University School of Law.

Don Walsh

Don Walsh is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Urban and Regional Policy. He has a strong background in economic development, particularly urban economic development, housing, and energy.

Richard O'Bryant

Richard O'Bryant is an Assistant Professor of Political Science and a Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Urban and Regional Policy at Northeastern University. O’Bryant received his doctorate in 2004 in Urban and Regional Studies from the Department of Urban Studies and Planning at MIT. O’Bryant also has a bachelor’s degree in computer systems engineering from Howard University.

Don Zizzi

Don Zizzi is a Senior Research Associate at the Center for Urban and Regional Policy. He is currently involved in developing and advancing the center's Economic Development Partnership to help communities around the country attract business and industries to their jurisdictions. He is also assisting in the center's survey of the manufacturing industry in Massachusetts. In addition to his work at CURP, Don is also an adjunct professor in UMass Lowell's Department of Regional Economic and Social Development and a Senior Fellow in their Center for Industrial Competitiveness.

Prior to joining the center, Don had extensive planning and management experience in both the public and private sectors. During his more than twenty years in public service, he has served as the Executive Director of Nashua Regional Planning Commission and chief planner in Schenectady County, NY, before that. In the private sector, Don managed U.S. remote facility development and operations for a Silicon Valley based technology firm, and he headed the company's strategic planning initiative to support future business opportunities and to plot the course for the company's global expansion. He has also founded and operated a start-up business of his own delivering specialized internet-based text over IP telecommunication service for large institutional customers serving the deaf, hard of hearing and speech restricted individuals. Don was one of the founding members of the Nashua, NH Center for Economic Development, serving eight years on its executive committee and helping to establish its innovative business incubator.

Don received his BA from Fordham University and his MPA from the Rockefeller School of Public Affairs and Policy. He lives in Nashua, NH with his wife, Kathy, a master elementary school teacher. He cites as his proudest accomplishments of the last few years: caring for an ailing parent (since deceased), attending all of his son's baseball games and writing a novel.

Eleanor G. White

Eleanor G. White is President of Housing Partners, Inc. and a founding member of CURP's World Class Collaborative. She has worked in the fields of affordable housing development, property asset management, and public administration since 1967. She was deputy director and chief of operations at the Massachusetts Housing Finance Agency from 1983 to 1995. Previously she held a variety of positions at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development from 1967 to 1983. She has served on a number of housing boards and commissions and has lectured widely on housing and real estate. She has won many awards for her work on affordable housing development.

Anne Habiby

Anne Habiby is a Senior Research Fellow at CURP, and is currently a visiting scholar at Northeastern University and Special Consultant to the President's Office on Urban Strategy. She is a guest lecturer at the Harvard Business School and the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, and is teaching a new graduate course on global competitive strategies for cities at the Illinois Institute of Technology with the Dean of the Stuart School of Business. She is currently researching a book on strategy entitled What's Your GPS? Global Positioning Strategies for Entrepreneurs and Cities.

Anne is a national expert in economic development. She is one of the founders of the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City (ICIC), a non-profit launched in 1995 by Harvard Business School professor Michael Porter. ICIC has engaged hundreds of business and civic leaders to expand the job and business base of distressed urban areas.

From 1996 to mid 2005, Anne led the organization as its Co-Executive Director. She oversaw all of ICIC's work and, collaborating closely with Michael Porter, pioneered strategies to advance the economic potential of inner cities. Additionally, Anne has worked with leaders in many U.S. cities, led over 15 research projects that contributed new insights that have been widely reported, help create the ICIC-Inc. Magazine Inner City 100 list which tracks 100 of the fastest growing companies located in inner cities, and was one of the founders of the national Inner City Economic Forum.

An advisor to a number of government and corporate leaders, Anne is regularly quoted by the media and is a requested speaker at conferences, and for television and radio programs. On behalf of the U.S. Department of Commerce Minority Business Development Agency, she hosts an annual business roundtable for over 700 entrepreneurs. Her panelists have included senior executives from FedEx, WallMart, IBM, and OfficeMax, as well as celebrated entrepreneurs and academics.

Anne was an investment banker in the Public Finance Department of Morgan Stanley & Co. specializing in finance for hospitals and universities. She holds degrees in economics from Barnard College of Columbia University and Cambridge University (UK). Anne has lived in New York, Boston, Los Angeles, Paris, Cambridge (UK), Beirut and Saudi Arabia. She has two young boys, Luke and Oliver.

Shelley McDonough Kimelberg

Shelley McDonough Kimelberg is an Assistant Professor of Sociology and a Senior Research Associate at the Center for Urban and Regional Policy (CURP). Her research focuses on economic development, urban poverty, and social policy. Shelley has served as a principal researcher on the Economic Development Partnership initiative since 2004. Her primary responsibilities include managing the collection of market data from the private sector, and the development of the Municipal Self-Assessment Tool. This work comprised a significant portion of her doctoral dissertation, Risky Business: An Examination of Firm Location Decisions and Their Implications for Inner Cities.

Prior to joining Northeastern, Shelley spent seven years working in knowledge management for a global management consulting firm. She received her Ph.D., M.A., and B.A. degrees from Harvard University.

Mary Huff Stevenson

Mary Huff Stevenson is a Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Urban and Regional Policy. Stevenson is a Professor of Economics at the University of Massachusetts Boston and Chair of the Department of Public Policy and Public Affairs at UMB's John W. McCormack Graduate School of Policy Studies.

At CURP, Stevenson is working with Barry Bluestone and Russell Williams on an urban policy textbook that will be published by Houghton Mifflin.

Stevenson has been widely published, and writes on a number of issues that complement her specific interests: urban poverty and labor market problems, the economic status of women, and development of urban public institutions. She is the author of three books, two of which were co-authored with CURP director Barry Bluestone. The Boston Renaissance: Race, Space, and Economic Change in an American Metropolis was published in 2000; Determinants of Low Wages for Women Workers was published in 1984; and Low Wages and the Working Poor was published in 1973.

She has also written for a wide number of publications, including Eastern Economics Journal, Borderlands of Economics: Essays in Honor of Daniel R. Fusfeld, For Crying out Loud: Women's Poverty in the United States, Third Women's Policy Research Conference Proceedings, For Crying out Loud: Analyses of Women in Poverty, Women Working, Nursing Forum, Boston Observer, The Dynamics of Labor Market Segmentation, and Sex, Discrimination, and the Division of Labor.

Stevenson was raised in New York and now lives in Brookline. She received her B.A. (1966) in economics from Brandeis University and her Ph.D. (1974) in economics from the University of Michigan.

Alan Clayton-Matthews

Alan Clayton-Matthews is Associate Professor and Director of Quantitative Methods in the Department of Public Policy and Policy Affairs, John W. McCormack Graduate School of Policy Studies, U.Mass.-Boston. He is currently on sabbatical leave at the Center for Urban and Regional Policy, where he is a Senior Research Associate.

Joe Christo

Joe Christo is the Communications Director at CURP and the School of Social Science, Urban Affairs, and Public Policy, coordinating all internal and external communications for both organizations. He manages the production of print, audio, video, multimedia, and web projects, including: the CURP website, the School's website, the Economic Development Partnership website, and the Heart of the City database, which documents environmental and social issues in the geographic center of Boston and allows residents to connect with community groups that share their concerns.

Before joining CURP full-time, Joe had been a contributor to the CURP website and had served as a Research Assistant at the center, working on the first Greater Boston Housing Report Card with Ryan Allen and Gretchen Weisman. Previously, he was the Associate Editor in the Corporate Communications department at John Hancock Financial Services. Joe is a graduate of Northeastern University, where he earned a B.A. in Journalism with a minor in Political Science. He also recently completed a graduate certificate program in the university's College of Business Administration.

Community and economic development, affordable housing, transportation, and education are among Joe's far-reaching interests in the fields of urban planning and policy.

Joe grew up in Greater Boston and, aside from short stints in Northern New Jersey and North Carolina, has been a resident of the area his entire life. In his free time he enjoys writing (journalistically and creatively), cooking, playing basketball, listening to all types of music, snowboarding, photography, and embarking on all types of travel and outdoor adventures. He currently lives in Boston with his girlfriend Meagan, and their experience with trying to find an apartment in the city has piqued his desire to learn more about affordable housing.

Marc Horne

Marc Horne is a Research Assistant at CURP, working with David Soule on the Older Industrial Cities project. He will also be assisting Don Walsh on a manufacturing study.

Horne recently completed the coursework for his master's degree in Regional Economic and Social Development (RESD) from UMass Lowell (UML), and will soon be defending his thesis on transit-oriented development in New England. After studying philosophy and fine art at UML as an undergraduate student, Horne enrolled in the RESD program following a senior-year class in environmental philosophy that caused him to question a lot of the policy decisions behind accepted environmental behavior.

Horne's personal research interests include looking at the philosophical basis of our governmental systems, laws and policy analysis procedures, and clarifying exactly what we mean when we talk about growth, development and sustainability. Quality of life issues surrounding economic development also engage Horne, who can often be found analyzing questions such as: "Even if something is growth or development, does it make peoples' lives better?'; "What do we mean when say sustainable growth?"; and "What should the aim of development be, whether economic or social?"

While Horne was a graduate student at UML he had a position as a research assistant, but also had no shortage of part-time jobs, something that has been the case since he was in high school. He has worked as a cook, bartender, and bouncer, and at a health club, a carpet store warehouse, a hardware store, and numerous construction jobs.

Born and raised in Lowell, MA, (where he currently lives), Horne's interests reach far and wide, ranging from cooking to drawing/painting to practicing combat sports, including Muay-Thai Kickboxing, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, Grappling and Western boxing. He is also a former football player and played semi-professionally for the Lowell Nor'Easters while taking a year off from his formal education in between high school and college. He is a frequent traveler, something that, along with reading, has helped determine his path.

Lauren Nicoll

Lauren Nicoll is a Research Associate at CURP, currently working with Don Walsh on the Massachusetts Manufacturing Study and working with Barry Bluestone, Bonnie Heudorfer, and Chase Billingham on the Greater Boston Housing Report Card. She is also working with the Boston Main Streets program on an Elder Friendly Business Districts survey.

Lauren earned her Bachelor's degree in sociology and business management from Drew University in Madison, NJ in 2004. She entered the PhD program at Northeastern in sociology in the fall of 2005 and is on track to receive her Master's degree this spring. Lauren has served as a teaching assistant for Race, Class and Gender; the Sociology of Work; Global Markets, Local Culture; and Social Theory.

After attending public school in one of NJ's Abbott Districts (designated by the NJ Supreme Court as economically disadvantaged municipalities providing inadequate education), Lauren is interested in education inequality as well as globalization, work and labor market outcomes.

In her free time, Lauren enjoys reading, cooking, finding free things to do in Boston and traveling to visit family and friends. She is looking forward to her upcoming trip to Badger, SD (pop. 144) for its Centennial celebration.

Chase Billingham

Chase Billingham is a Research Associate at CURP and a graduate student in the Northeastern University Department of Sociology. He received a B.A. in sociology and French from Tulane University in 2006.

Chase was a co-author, with Barry Bluestone, David Soule, Marc Horne, and Lauren Nicoll, of The Potential for Uneven Economic Development across Massachusetts Municipalities: An Analysis of the Role of Property Tax and State Local Aid. This report, sponsored by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, compared recent economic trends in older industrial cities and rapidly growing communities in Massachusetts, highlighting the deleterious effects that an eroding tax base can have on the ability of cities and towns to provide municipal services, and showing how state intervention through the provision of local aid can mitigate the potential for uneven development. Out of this research, Chase also joined Barry Bluestone in writing "The Property Tax and the Fortunes of Older Industrial Cities," which appeared in the January 2008 issue of Land Lines, the quarterly journal of the Lincoln Institute.

Chase contributed to the Greater Boston Housing Report Card 2006-2007, and is currently collaborating with Don Walsh and other CURP staff on a study of manufacturing in Massachusetts.

His academic interests are in urban sociology and the sociology of education. He is currently engaged in two projects related to school choice, examining (1) the effects of school choice efforts on neighboring and neighborhood affect, and (2) the contentious relationship between school choice advocates and teachers’ unions.

He lives in Dorchester.

David Streim

David Streim is a Research Fellow at CURP assisting on a variety of projects. He received a B.A. from Vassar College in 2005 and has been living in the Boston area since 2006. David held recent intern positions at Interlock media, contributing to a documentary film examining sexual abuse in US prisons, and at the International Institute of Boston where he tutored immigrants applying for citizenship.

He will be pursuing a master's degree in urban planning in the near future, and in the meantime hopes to learn more about the issues that influence the work of city planners through his involvement at CURP, particularly with regard to community development and affordable housing.

In his off hours, David is taking evening classes, attending lectures, and creating musical morsels in his modest home studio. He is also impressed by the abundance of burrito establishments in Boston and attempts to keep them all in business (either through zoning policies or frequent patronage).

Keisha Gayle-Luz

Keisha Gayle-Luz recently joined CURP as a Work-study Office Assistant for Heather Seligman as well as working with other staff members on current projects.

Keisha just started attending Northeastern University as a sophomore transfer student from University of San Francisco in the fall of 2007. Although she grew up in Western Massachusetts, most of her family is from and live around the Boston area, so coming to school in Boston was like moving back home after San Francisco. Keisha is a psychology major with an interest in law, and hopes to attend law school when she graduates.

In her spare time Keisha enjoys spending time with her family and friends, reading, watching sports, especially the Red Sox and the Patriots, and gymnastics. Also having grown up in a small town, Keisha enjoys exploring Boston and is loving the city life.

Eleni Himaras

Eleni Himaras is the part-time, Assistant Online Editor for the CURP and School of Social Science, Urban Affairs, and Public Policy web sites. In this capacity, she keeps both web sites updated by collecting information and writing original material.

She is a senior Journalism major who has spent all three of her co-ops at The Patriot Ledger in Quincy, working in news, features, and business, while dabbling in photography and video-editing. Interested in all things journalism, she is working as a stringer for the paper while honing her web skills and knowledge of the inter-workings of urban affairs at CURP.

Her interests also include distance running (she is currently in training for this year’s Boston Marathon), travel, cooking and country music. She grew up in Annapolis, Maryland and currently lives in Boston. She spent the previous semester studying abroad in Greece and traveling around Europe.

Katja Schiller

Katja Schiller is a Research Assistant working with David Soule on the Economic Development Partnership project.

Her current research interests include urban economic development, police-community relations, homeland security, and conflict resolution and management.

Farid Faid Farid

Farid Faid Farid is a Visiting Fellow at CURP, on leave from Cairo University in Egypt, where he serves on the Urban and Regional Planning faculty as a full-time assistant professor in the Urban Design department (since 2000) and also as a part-time senior researcher in the Center of Research and Urban Studies. Farid's teaching experience has spanned thirteen years, covering various courses and studios concerning architecture, urban design, landscape design, upgrading and conservation, site planning, graphic presentation, housing, and human and environment.

While at CURP, Farid is continuing work on his doctoral thesis, focusing on the impact of various urban regulation systems, a comparative study of the techniques used in the United States to maintain cities' urban character.

As an urban planner his private work extends over eleven years, covering forty-two city planning and landscape design projects in Egypt and emirate, under both local governmental and internationally-funded projects. Farid has also been involved with many municipalities in Egypt such as South Sinai, Aswan, and Red Sea governorates in various planning projects in existing towns and new development extensions - Dahb , Nuweiba , Sharm el Sheikh, and Hurghada, to name a few.

He received his Master’s degree in Urban Planning from Cairo University's Urban and Regional Planning faculty in 2000, with a concentration in urban regulation systems. His research and reading interests are in the visual studies of urban design, codes and regulations systems, zoning ordinance and land use development, and sustainable urban control.

In his spare time, Farid enjoys working with computers and software, listening to music, traveling, camping, photography, swimming, and football (soccer).

Sarah Heim

Sarah Heim serves as an Independent Consultant for the Center, advising on issues related to the CURP website and the Heart of the City project. She is also working with Northeastern faculty and staff on developing a Boston Community Convention and Awards event.

Sarah worked full-time at CURP for three years as Managing Editor. Prior to that, she was a reporter in the San Francisco bureau of Adweek Magazine. She has written for the San Jose Mercury News, San Jose Magazine, Palo Alto Weekly, Modernbride.com, Stanford Magazine and Folio Magazine, among other publications.

Before earning a graduate degree in journalism from Stanford University, Sarah worked in publicity and subsidiary rights at Beacon Press, an independent book publisher in Boston. She grew up in Vienna, Virginia and earned her bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Virginia. She recently earned her second master's degree in English Literature at Northeastern and now teaches English Composition at Westfield State College in Westfield, Massachusetts.

When she's not writing, Sarah enjoys traveling, basketball, gardening, bowling, and an occasional trip to the arcade for a game of skee-ball. She lives in Northampton, Massachusetts with her husband, Chris O'Connor.

Alexandra Curley

Alexandra Curley has been a Research Associate at CURP since 2003, and is currently working on the Maverick Gardens HOPE VI evaluation. She graduated with a Ph.D. in Sociology from Boston University in 2006, with an interest in urban studies and social policy.

Curley’s recent research includes working on an evaluation of the social services at the Mission Main HOPE VI community; a process evaluation for the Columbia Point Economic Literacy and Individual Development Account (IDA) Program; and an assessment of the effects of welfare reform on immigrant mothers’ access to education and training in Massachusetts.

She holds a B.A. in Sociology and Women’s Studies from Northeastern University (2000). In between working and studying, Curley enjoys walking on the beach, skiing in Colorado, and traveling.