Neighbors Helping Neighbors - Board of Directors

Board of Directors

Joi M. Corrothers, Treasurer Joi is Assistant Vice President of Corporate Treasury specializing in capital management at MetLife, Inc., a leading provider of insurance and other financial services. Her Wall Street career includes investment banking experience gained in: the Media and Telecommunications Group at Credit Suisse First Boston; the Real Estate Investment Bank at Bankers Trust; the Corporate & Equity Operations Group at J.P. Morgan; and Southern National Bank in North Carolina. Joi is a member of the Houston-Chavers Initiative (HCI), an incubator for black businesses, and contributes to the HCI Quarterly Journal. Her busy volunteer life has centered on mentoring and career development for students of color. She is a member of the Alumni Leadership Committee of Sponsors for Educational Opportunity, and serves as a mentor and sponsor for at-risk high school students. Joi holds a BS in Business Administration from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She lives in Park Slope and also serves on the Board of Directors of the Opera Company of Brooklyn.

Shai J. Gross Shai joined the Board of Neighbors Helping Neighbors in the winter of 2007, after moving to Sunset Park the previous year. Shai currently works as an affordable housing developer for the Progress of People's Development Corporation, and brings a focus on environmental sustainablility to both new construction and existing buildings. Shai also teaches at CUNY in the Department of Architectural Technology of NYCCT. Previously, Shai has worked as an architect, urban planner and urban designer at various award-wining NYC-based firms. Outside of work, Shai continues to write, research, and design green educational public architecture installations, both individually and collectively. Shai's educational background includes a Master of Science in Regional and Urban Planning from the London School of Economics, a Master of Architecture from Columbia University, and a Bachelor of Arts - Urban Studies/Economics - from Barnard College-Columbia University.

Julie A. Lawrence As director of the Lawyer Referral Service at the Brooklyn Bar Association from 1994 to 2004, Julie sent many low and moderate-income clients to NHN for assistance with housing issues who might not otherwise have received help the help they needed. She has been active in planning, open space and environmental issues in Williamsburg/Greenpoint for many years. Julie was centrally involved in the outreach, policy development and adoption of the community's award-winning 197-a plan. She serves as a member of Brooklyn's Community Board #1, and is a member of the Steering Committee of the Campaign for Community Based Planning at the Municipal Art Society. Since 2005, Julie has been executive director of the Bronx Land Trust, a community-based organization which manages and stewards grassroots-run community gardens throughout the Bronx. Julie has been on the board of NHN since 2003.

Sean Patrick Neill Mr. Neill was raised in Kentucky and lived for several years on 5th Avenue in Park Slope before moving to Fort Greene. In 1994 he earned a degree in political science from Brown University and in 1998 he earned a masters in agricultural economics from Cornell University. After college, he worked in Washington DC on Central and South American policy issues, and served as an election observer in Guatemala. He speaks fluent Spanish. After graduate school, he worked at the Ford Foundation making grants for international human rights work. He now works at a housing finance-consulting firm, where he leads a program to fund energy efficiency rehabilitation of low-income housing. Mr. Neill was introduced to NHN by his co-worker, Rebecca Reich (who served as a consultant to NHN's "Brooklyn Upstairs" project).

Elizabeth Norman, Secretary Elizabeth Norman is a Sunset Park resident who joined NHN's board in June 2006. She works as a budget analyst in the Social Services Task Force of the NYC Office of Management and Budget. Elizabeth earned a master's degree in public administration, focusing on public finance, from the Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service at NYU in 2006 and a bachelor's degree in history from Oberlin College in 1996. Elizabeth is also a board member of the Brooklyn-based New York City AIDS Housing Network, and she volunteers as a fundraising consultant for the Afghan Women's Network, based in Kabul, Afghanistan.

Kirsten Shaw Kirsten is Senior Project Manager at The Hudson Companies, Inc., a Brooklyn-based residential real estate developer. From 2000 through 2005, she worked at the New York City Economic Development Corporation, where she managed public/private development projects on behalf the City, ranging from a charter school, to the rehab of a historic block in the Seaport, to the acquisition of Governors Island. She also worked in the Strategic Planning department, focusing on policies to promote the productive reuse of contaminated brownfield sites. Previously she was a consultant to municipalities and developers at Economic & Planning Systems, Inc., in Berkeley, CA. She has a Masters in City Planning from University of California, at Berkeley, and a BA in International Studies from Ohio Wesleyan University. In 2004-2005 she participated in the Coro Leadership New York program. Originally from Maryland, Kirsten moved to Prospect Heights in 2000, where she currently lives with her husband, Neil Kittredge.

Michael Wadman, President Michael is the managing partner of Hudson Affordable Housing LLC, a recently created affiliate of the Hudson Companies, Inc., a Brooklyn-based real estate developer. Hudson Affordable is dedicated to the development of multifamily rental, homeownership and supportive housing affordable to low-, moderate-, and middle-income people. Prior to joining Hudson in 2004, Michael was a Senior Vice President at the New York State Housing Finance Agency and Affordable Housing Corporation. He has also served as an Assistant Vice President at J.P. Morgan Chase Community Development Corporation and as a Budget Analyst at the NYC Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD). Michael holds an MBA in real estate from the Haas School of Business (University of California at Berkeley) and a BA from Harvard University. He has lived in Brooklyn since moving to New York in 1989 and currently resides near Columbia Street in Carroll Gardens with his wife Maura Minsky and daughters Lucy and Edie Wadman.

Perrin Wicks Perrin has spent most of her life in New York and moved to Brooklyn in 1998. She received her master's degree in public administration from the Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service at NYU in 1998 and a bachelor's degree in art history from Yale in 1993. Perrin's professional work has focused on youth development and non-profit management. Past jobs have included managing and delivering arts education programs in public schools for non-profit theaters, working at the Ford Foundation as a Program Associate in Youth Development, Community Development Associates, a nonprofit technical assistance provider based in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, and the Community Resource Exchange (CRE) as a consultant to non-profit community-based organizations in New York City in planning, board development, and fundraising. Perrin is now Director of Partnerships at the Urban Assembly, an organization that starts and supports new small public high schools in NYC. She was introduced to NHN by her former colleague, friend and NHN board member Sean Neill.

David Witt, Vice-President Born and raised in Kentucky, David has lived in Brooklyn for 10 years (currently in Windsor Terrace). He received a bachelor's in economics from the University of Kentucky and a master's in international public policy from NYU. David is Director of Finance & Administration at the International Peace Academy, an independent research organization that works closely with the UN, governments, and others on issues of security, conflict resolution, peacekeeping, and development. Prior to that, he served as Director of Medical Enterprise at Continuum Health Partners, a New York hospital system, and Director of Finance & Operations at the International Trachoma Initiative, a nonprofit working to eliminate the world's leading cause of preventable blindness. David has also held jobs in state government, banking, financial insurance, publishing, and teaching, and has lived and worked in Korea and Japan.