Associate Director, Local Policy

The Annie E Casey Foundation

Scot Spencer leads The Annie E. Casey Foundation’s work in advancing community-focused policies, practices and strategies that increase opportunities for children, families and the places where they live.
Before taking on these roles, Spencer managed Casey’s investments in East Baltimore, where the Foundation has worked to strengthen community and economic development in a historic, low-income neighborhood next door to the Johns Hopkins University medical campus. He previously was a transportation specialist at the Environmental Defense Fund, where he focused on state-level smart-growth policy and Commuter Choice, a local tax incentive for people who use transit. He also served as deputy director for Historic East Baltimore Community Action Coalition. There, he led the federal Bridges to Work demonstration, which provided job training and placement services for residents in East and West Baltimore, as well as transportation from their neighborhoods to employment centers in the suburbs.

Founder

Neighborhood Teams

My career began in the youth service world helping start City Year and working with programs like Hands On Atlanta and Citizen Schools. Then transitioned to the world of social software where I worked for a number of start-ups, Yahoo! Groups, and then twelve years at Nextdoor. Most recently I have been serving on local boards (JCC and AYSO) and working on a number of neighborhood initiatives and prototypes.

President & CEO

Woodlawn United

Mashonda S. Taylor is President and CEO of Woodlawn United, the nonprofit leading comprehensive revitalization in Birmingham’s Woodlawn and Kingston communities. A nationally recognized leader in place-based community transformation, she works across philanthropic, public, and private sectors to advance housing, education, economic mobility, and resident leadership.

Under her leadership, Woodlawn United has leveraged more than $60 million in community investment, secured significant federal and state funding, and cultivated strategic partnerships that accelerate revitalization and influence public policy.

A sought-after speaker and strategic advisor, Mashonda brings expertise in aligning leadership, investment, and policy to drive sustainable change. She holds a bachelor’s degree from Loyola University New Orleans and a master’s in organizational leadership from Gonzaga University. A three-time Birmingham Business Journal Power 60 honoree and its 2023 Nonprofit CEO of the Year, she remains committed to strengthening neighborhoods, developing leaders, and creating opportunities for residents to thrive.

Fellow

NYU

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 the Distinguished Visiting Urbanist at the NYU Wagner School of Public Service.
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.

Director of Civic Engagement

Together Chicago

Nate Tubbs is the Director of Civic Engagement at Together Chicago. In this role Nate leads the Building Blocks of Peace initiative which provides practical training for individuals and organizations seeking the wellbeing of their neighborhoods. He developed the seasonal rhythms framework of Faith-Community Mobilization which galvanizes individuals, organizations, and congregations in annual, repeatable actions for unity and collaboration. Nate is co-creator of Chicagoland United in Prayer, Hands Across Chicago, and Chicago Good Neighbor Week.

Nate is deeply committed to his neighborhood on the West side of Chicago through resident-led organizing. He organized neighbors to create the Island Oasis Nature Play Garden (2018-2021). He helped restart the Island Civic Association (2021), co-founded Roosevelt-Austin Mutual Aid (2024), and their summer Youth Connector Cohort.

Nate is also a Chicago Peace Fellow (2023), certified practitioner of sociocracy with Sociocracy for All (2026), and certified neighborhood leader with the US Chamber of Connection (2026).

Founder

Transit

Community is my core value and primary method of change. I build programs and infrastructure that create trust at scale, from neighborhoods across the US to The New York Times to Google.

As a civic entrepreneur, I’m developing Small Good Worlds, a free six-part training that teaches people to launch hyper-local networks that build pockets of trust where we live. After a 2026 three-city pilot, we’re expanding to 30 cities in 2027.

At The New York Times, I stood up the Office of Inclusion as its first Vice President, delivering on 24 public commitments alongside company-wide strategies and building a culture of togetherness.

At Google, I was their first community manager, co-founded Women Techmakers (supporting 1.5M women a year, 190 countries), and co-led the Tech Equity Collective, Google’s first public initiative for Black technologists.

I now consult with institutions focused on building internal and external trust.

Managing Director, William Julius Wilson Institute

Harlem Children's Zone

Wendy Viola leads the William Julius Wilson Institute at Harlem Children's Zone, where she develops and leads efforts to deepen and spread understanding of neighborhood-based cradle-to-career strategies across the field and among key stakeholder groups, and oversees the provision of technical assistance to neighborhood-based organizations. A community psychologist by training, she has nearly two decades 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.

Senior Director

Knight Foundation

Lilly Weinberg is a senior director at Knight Foundation, where she leads national initiatives that strengthen communities through economic opportunity, social connection and civic participation. Since joining Knight in 2012, she has managed a $140 million portfolio across 18 small to midsize communities and built partnerships that connect local innovation with national learning.

Her work spans entrepreneurship, public spaces, social infrastructure and local government innovation, helping communities turn promising ideas into practical approaches that improve residents’ lives.

Weinberg has served on the boards of the International Downtown Association and Friends of the Underline. She currently serves on the Northern Valley Greenway Committee, helping advance an eight-mile rail trail connecting six New Jersey boroughs. She lives in the New York City metro area with her two sons and their adorable goldendoodle, Bamba.

Fellow

Flourishing Neighborhoods

Sarah Weller Pegna is an experienced public health practitioner, DrPH student at Johns Hopkins, and believer in the power of local action. With more than 15 years of experience working at the intersection of public health and local governance, Sarah’s work centers on building strong local systems and policies that support collective action, cross-sector partnerships, and community engagement to improve community well-being.

She has held roles from local action in Chatham County, NC, to national leadership positions, including Program Director for the National League of Cities' Health & Wellbeing portfolio and Senior Program Analyst at the National Association of County and City Health Officials. She currently serves as a Fellow with Flourishing Neighborhoods.

Sarah earned her MPH in Health Behavior from the University of North Carolina and her undergraduate degree from Susquehanna University. In her spare time, she enjoys exploring her hometown, Portland, OR, with her husband and three daughters.

CEO

Cerca Solutions

Kirk Wester-Rivera is the founder and CEO of Cerca Solutions, a Denver-based consulting firm that works with organizations and leaders across the country building thriving neighborhoods in under-resourced communities. He has worked in and alongside neighborhoods since 1998.
For 13 years, Kirk led Growing Together, the organization he founded in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Aligned with the Purpose Built Communities pillars, it rested on the belief that a neighborhood where children can thrive sets the stage for lasting economic vitality. That work produced more than 500 units of mixed-income housing, including a mixed-income neighborhood trust, along with neighborhood school transformation and a CDFI that opened access to capital for local businesses.
Since founding Cerca Solutions in 2023, he has launched the Thriving Neighborhoods Lab, which brings together expertise in housing, education, economic development, community organizing, and leadership development for efforts committed to an inclusive, just approach to neighborhood change.

Executive Director

Growing Together

Kaitlin Williams is the Executive Director of Growing Together, a Tulsa-based nonprofit working to strengthen neighborhoods and expand opportunities for children and families through a holistic, resident-centered approach to community development. Since joining Growing Together in 2017, Kaitlin has served in various operational and leadership roles, helping shape the organization's growth, strategic direction, and partnerships.

With an educational background in Organizational Leadership, Social Work, and Spanish, and prior experience in K-12 education, Kaitlin brings a cross-sector perspective to her work. She is passionate about building strong partnerships, aligning resources around community priorities, and creating the conditions for neighborhoods to be places where every resident, child, and family can thrive. Through Growing Together's partnership with Purpose Built Communities, she works alongside residents and community partners to strengthen the structural and social fabric of Tulsa's neighborhoods and build pathways to long-term prosperity.

Co-Founder & CEO

Front Porch Forum

Michael and his wife Valerie launched Front Porch Forum 20 years ago, and he has led its development since then. FPF is a Vermont public benefit corporation that helps neighbors connect and build community, primarily by hosting a network of local online Forums that cover every town and neighborhood in Vermont. FPF has 250,000 active members in a state with only 270,000 households. Previously, Michael led a New England trade association of utilities, worked with dozens of U.S. cities on environmental technologies, conducted research for a DC-based localization think tank, and invented a sorting machine for recyclables. He and Valerie raised their four kids in the Five Sisters neighborhood of Burlington that they've called home for three decades.

SVP, Community Impact and Resident Services

Enterprise Community Development

Laura Green Zeilinger, J.D., is Senior Vice President of Community Impact & Resident Services at Enterprise Community Partners, where she leads Resident Services across Enterprise Community Development and helps advance Enterprise's national strategy. She is guiding a five-year, resident-driven strategic plan designed to make ECD a model for resident-centered community development.
Previously, Laura spent a decade as Director of the District of Columbia Department of Human Services, leading 1,500 staff and a $933 million budget serving more than 275,000 residents. Under her leadership, the District reduced family homelessness by 73 percent between 2016 and 2024 and effectively ended chronic family homelessness. She also helped design Career MAP, a pilot with the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta that addressed benefit cliffs, and led major TANF reforms,
Earlier, she served as Executive Director of the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness.

President & Founder

Healthcare Anchor Network

David Zuckerman is the founder and president of the Healthcare Anchor Network. He is a national thought leader on the role of health systems as anchor institutions in building community wealth and inclusive economic development.
David is the co-author of several reports that have helped propel forward the anchor mission movement, including Hospitals Aligned for Healthy Communities toolkit series. He is also the author of Hospitals Building Healthier Communities: Embracing the Anchor Mission and a contributor to Can Hospitals Heal America’s Communities. He is the lead author of a National Academy of Medicine discussion paper, Building a Culture of Health at the Federal Level and a contributor to 2020 Surgeon General’s Report on Community Health and Economic Prosperity.
David has been an invited speaker at key sector events: World Health Organization, American Hospital Association, Association of Academic Health Centers, the National Academy of Medicine, and Modern Healthcare’s Leadership Summit.