An Impact Look Book

Every now and then I get to put my journalism skills to work for my clients. For the National Development Council, I conceived, crafted and project-managed the organization’s first-ever Impact Look Book. Because NDC works behind the scenes on every aspect of economic development, it’s not always clear how this work affects real people’s lives. The Look Book features three uniquely impactful stories. A single father with two teenage sons finds an affordable home in a family-friendly neighborhood in Gallatin TN, where the average housing price has risen from $150,000 to $350,000 in the last decade. An immigrant family in …

Preserving Housing and a Community

This is why I love working with the National Development Council. This fifty-year-old nonprofit does the hard work that other economic development organizations just don’t know how to do. In this case, NDC worked for five years to help Scotland, a community in Potomac, MD — founded in the late 1800s by formerly enslaved people — to upgrade its housing while maintaining affordability in one of the most expensive counties in the US. Three previous attempts to upgrade the outmoded housing ended in frustration until NDC got involved. Providing both technical financial assistance and hands-on community building expertise, NDC’s field director …