CEO

Life remodeled

Diallo Smith, a native Detroiter, is the Chief Executive Officer of Life Remodeled, a non-profit dedicated to sustainable and equitable neighborhood revitalization. He leads a team in repurposing vacant school buildings into vibrant hubs of opportunity, serving tens of thousands of students and community members annually.

With 20+ years of experience in planning and executing projects, Diallo has enhanced customer satisfaction, increased revenue, improved efficiency, and fostered organizational growth. He oversees day-to-day operations, fiscal health, major projects, and organizational culture, while developing leadership strategies and providing risk management guidance.

Diallo’s career spans roles in finance and consulting at ExxonMobil, BP Amoco, and IBM, as well as entrepreneurship as founder of Drive Ping Pong Bar & Grille. He holds a bachelor’s degree in finance from Wilberforce University and a Master of Divinity from Southern Methodist University. Diallo and his wife, Dr. Jameel Smith, enjoy live music, exploring restaurants.

Executive Director

CommunityWorks

Eric Smith is the Executive Director of CommunityWorks, a national nonprofit that equips cities and communities to unlock the human and economic potential of their neighborhoods by integrating proven Asset-Based Community Development practices. Eric also serves as a Community & Economic Development Educator for Central State University (CSU), Ohio’s only public historically black university. Eric’s focus at CSU is on cultivating strong regional food systems and building entrepreneurial ecosystems. For over two decades, he has been living his purpose to, in his words, “build flourishing communities in which ALL people can thrive.” He has done this in the rural villages of Uganda, the small towns of Appalachia, and the urban neighborhoods of rust belt cities. A resident of Toledo, Ohio, Eric has a Master's in Community Development and holds professional certifications in such models as Energizing Entrepreneurial Communities and Asset-Based Community Development.

CEO

Full Frame Initiative

Katya Fels Smyth has spent over 30 years challenging assumptions and structures underlying American systems — including that scale and perpetuity are inherently valuable — and leading organizations and alliances that offer a new way forward. Katya’s impact is felt in communities across the country in fields including community development, human services, planning, justice, and climate. In 1995 she founded On The Rise, a community of women left out of most neighborhood development conversations. In 2009 she founded Full Frame Initiative, a national social change organization partnering with communities and government entities to drive wellbeing equity through power and resource-shifting. In 2024 FFI initiated a transition of its mission to a national network of leaders. A former Echoing Green Fellow, Affiliate of MIT’s Co-Lab, and Research Fellow at Harvard, Katya is a mom and spouse living on a Massachusetts farm where people grow artisanal garlic and rescue animals live the good life

Executive Director

Parish Collective

Tim Soerens is the Co-Founding executive director of the Parish Collective, a network of churches around the United States focused on neighborhood flourishing. He recently wrote, “Everywhere You Look: Discovering the Church, Right Where You Are.”

His co-authored first book “The New Parish: How Neighborhood Churches Transform Mission, Discipleship, and Community (Intervarsity Press, 2014) won multiple awards, including Christianity Today’s award of merit.

A convener at heart, he has launched multiple sold-out conferences including the Inhabit Conference, New Parish Conference UK, Conspire Gathering. He also co-founded Neighborhood Economics to connect the people repairing local economies.

A popular speaker, Tim communicates each year to a broad cross section of organizations and denominations in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand. He lives in Chicago with his family.

Associate Director, Local Policy

The Annie E. Casey Foundation

Scot Spencer leads The Annie E. Casey Foundation’s efforts to advance community-focused policies and strategies that expand opportunities for children, families, and neighborhoods. Previously, he managed the Foundation’s investments in East Baltimore, strengthening community and economic development in a historic low-income area near Johns Hopkins University. He has also served as a transportation specialist at the Environmental Defense Fund, focusing on smart-growth policy and transit incentives, and as deputy director of the Historic East Baltimore Community Action Coalition, leading federal job training and placement programs.

Earlier in his career, Spencer worked in private architectural practice, community development, and university relations in upstate New York. He holds several civic leadership roles, serving on the boards of the Maryland Film Festival, Baltimore Center Stage, Central Maryland Transportation Alliance, Greater New Orleans Funders Network, and the AJL Foundation, and is a member of the Baltimore Regional Transit Commission.

Co- Director

The U.S. Studio for Placemaking

Co-Executive Director

Project for Public Spaces

Nate Storring is a Co-Executive Director at Project for Public Spaces, a nonprofit organization that unlocks the power of public space to strengthen the well-being of communities around the world. Nate has spent most of his career making city planning more accessible through public programming and publications, including two published books, Vital Little Plans: The Short Works of Jane Jacobs (Random House, 2016) and Hyperlocal: Place Governance in a Fragmented World (Brookings Press, 2022).

Founder

Neighborhood Teams

I have 25 years of experience building and managing user generated content communities, as well as experience in the education and non-profit worlds. I most recently spent twelve years at Nextdoor leading community and neighborhood operations and seven years at Yahoo! product managing Yahoo! Groups. In the late 90s, I worked at a number of community technology start-ups; and before that, I worked in the youth service world helping to start the program City Year, where my work included developing the school partnership program. Currently, I’m working on an idea called Neighborhood Teams, which is focused on mobilizing neighborhood volunteers in the same way that PTAs mobilize parent volunteers in schools. I’m also involved in developing community programs at my temple and local JCC, where I serve on the board. In addition, I’m an enthusiastic participant in the Relational Technology Project.

CEO/Founder

DBG Detroit

Khali Sweeney is the founder and CEO of the Driven By Growth Detroit (DBG)--one of the nation’s leading out-of-school time programs. A visionary youth mentor with a relentless passion for helping young people succeed, Khali leveraged his lived experience to create a safe, nurturing, and inspiring space where students can realize their own passions and pursue success as they see it. As a native Detroiter, Khali has attended some of the same schools and has lived in some of the same neighborhoods as many of the students DBG now serves. Khali’s intimate knowledge of this community has helped his team to understand the unique challenges facing families in and around Detroit while generating comprehensive programming interventions designed to support lifelong, wellbeing. DBG has been recognized as a national leader in youth development by philanthropist MacKenzie Scott, the National Science Foundation, and the U.S. Library of Congress.

Senior Advisor

Build from Within Alliance

Mihailo Temali is Founder and President of the Neighborhood Development Center. In partnership with many community groups, NDC has trained 4,500 low-income entrepreneurs since 1993, in a 20-week course. 500 are in business today, 82% owners of color. NDC is a CDFI, SBA and Reba-Free lender, focusing on start-up and growing inner-city businesses, and provides 5000 hours of business assistance annually. NDC is co-owner, developer and manager of six business incubators including Midtown Global Market, Mercado Central and Frogtown Square. Temali is the author of “Community Economic Development Handbook,” and was a Bush Fellow in Boston and Santiago, Chile

Co-Founder

Relational Tech Project

Deborah Tien is the Co-Founder of the Relational Tech Project, exploring how to support people to build ‘small is beautiful’ technologies to meet the needs of the places they live. This project emerged after a few years of building relationships with neighborhood stewards around the USA, experimenting with ways technology could support their work via her company Common Agency. Before this, she spent about a decade overseas, primarily leading a local appropriate technology wood & metal shop in Arusha, Tanzania.

Fellow

NYU Marron Sustaining Places Initiative/ Brookings Metro

Tim Tompkins has worked to transform cities through public spaces and public private partnerships. He leads the Sustaining Places Initiative at NYU’s Marron Institute and is a Nonresident Senior Fellow at Brookings Institution's Metro Program.

Tompkins was President of the Times Square Alliance, one of the nation’s pre-eminent Business Improvement Districts (BIDs), from 2002-2020. He is former Chair of the International Downtown Association and was the Founding Director of Partnerships for Parks, which won an Innovation in Government Award from Harvard's JFK School of Government and the Ford Foundation for its work in revitalizing the Bronx River. He has an undergraduate degree from Yale and an MBA from Wharton.

Former Senior Adviser, Community and Economic Development

Formerly Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta

Managing Director, Field Building & Research

WJWI at Harlem Children's Zone

Wendy Viola oversees field building and research for the Institute, where she develops and leads efforts to deepen and spread understanding of the foundations and evidence of neighborhood-based cradle-to-career strategies across and beyond the field. In this role, Wendy serves as the connective tissue for the organization, ensuring the core ethos of WJWI’s mission and approach are infused into every aspect of its field-building work, codifying and articulating the evidence base for the field, upholding high standards and reflecting consistent messaging about the power and promise of locally-led approaches. A community psychologist by training, she has 16 years of experience in the field of research and evaluation in academic and applied settings, including the New York City Mayor’s Office of ThriveNYC and the Harlem Children’s Zone’s Research and Evaluation team. Wendy earned her bachelor’s degree from Cornell University and Masters and PhD in Applied Psychology from Portland State University.

CEO/President

Christian Community Development Association

Lorenzo A. Watson is the CEO/President of the Christian Community Development Association (CCDA) in Chicago, IL. With a career spanning community development, education, and Biblical justice, Lorenzo brings extensive experience in organizational leadership and strategic planning. He spent nearly two decades at North Carolina State University (NCSU), leading the Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering IT department while mentoring student leaders. At CCDA, Lorenzo has held key roles in communications, education, and event planning. He holds a BS in Computer Engineering from NCSU, an MDiv from Shaw University Divinity School, and a PhD in Educational Research and Policy Analysis. Lorenzo and his wife, Natarsha P. Sanders, serve as community pastors in Kerrville, Texas, fostering inclusion and belonging in every space they engage.