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LISC/Chicago organizes capital and other resources to support initiatives that will stimulate the comprehensive development of healthy, stable neighborhoods and foster their connection to the socioeconomic mainstream of the metropolitan region. LISC's $125 million investment in Chicago's neighborhoods over the past 25 years has leveraged $3.2 billion in financing from private and public sources.
Officers
Andrew Mooney is Senior Program Director for the LISC/Chicago office. Mooney has extensive experience in housing, economic and community development. He has served as executive director and chairman of the Chicago Housing Authority, managed the Des Moines Chamber of Commerce and started a consulting firm focused on urban economic development, housing and labor issues. Mooney graduated from Notre Dame and received a master's degree from the University of Chicago. He joined LISC/Chicago in 1995.
Joel Bookman serves as Program Director for LISC/Chicago. Bookman is a consultant in strategic planning, economic and real estate development, and nonprofit management, and he is a lecturer in nonprofit management at the North Park University Graduate School of Business. He previously has led comprehensive community development efforts on Chicago’s northwest side while serving as chief executive of four different organizations. Bookman holds a master of urban planning and policy degree from the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Susana L. Vasquez serves as New Communities Program Director for LISC/Chicago, where she handles overall program management for NCP as well as program officer responsibilities for five target communities: Quad Communities, Humboldt Park, Logan Square, Chicago Lawn and Auburn Gresham. She worked in community-based organizations for more than 12 years, most recently as deputy director of The Resurrection Project, a community development organization in the Pilsen neighborhood that serves as an NCP lead agency. She has a bachelor’s in history from the University of Illinois and a master in public administration degree from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.
Keri Blackwell serves as a Program Officer for three NCP communities—Little Village, North Lawndale and the Near West Side—as well as the Building Community Through the Arts program at LISC/Chicago. Blackwell has worked for LISC for more than 10 years, starting at its national office in New York before coming to Chicago. Prior to that she worked for the Democratic National Convention Committee. She holds a bachelor’s degree in sociology and social welfare from the University of Wisconsin.
Ricki Granetz Lowitz advises NCP communities on workforce development and developing Centers for Working Families. Lowitz worked on employment issues for the Comprehensive Community Revitalization Program in the South Bronx, the program after which NCP is modeled. She holds a master's degree in public policy from Columbia University.
Sandra Womack serves as a Program Officer for three NCP communities, Pilsen, Washington Park and South Chicago, while working on Great Neighborhoods and employment initiatives for LISC/Chicago. Womack also administers the Leadership Fund, which provides training and technical assistance to community development organizations, and she manages LISC Chicago’s/Americorps program. She holds a master’s degree in business administration from Lake Forest Graduate School of Management.
Consultants
To supplement LISC staff, the NCP program uses a "scribe team" of contract writers, designers and photographers to manage and implement the program's communications components.
Patrick Barry is an expert on urban issues and Chicago neighborhoods, with 26 years experience as a free-lance journalist and editorial consultant. He has written for the Chicago Sun-Times, U.S. News & World Report and many nonprofit organizations. Barry directs staffing and manages the content for all NCP communication vehicles.
John McCarron worked for the Chicago Tribune as a reporter, columnist and editorial writer for 29 years and was vice president for strategy and communication for the Metropolitan Planning Council. McCarron is contributing editor of RE:NEW, writes articles and reports, and serves as NCP's in-house critic.
Beatriz Ponce de León has 15 years experience with human services organizations including Illinois Caucus for Adolescent Health, and for three years provided oral and written translations for LISC's Banking on Family Child Care program. She contributes to RE:NEW and translates NCP documents.
Ed Finkel has 17 years experience as a writer and editor, serving as managing editor of The Neighborhood Works and editor of the magazine and web site for Northwestern's Medill School of Journalism. He contributes to RE:NEW and is managing editor of this web site.
Other scribes are Richard Muhammad, who has extensive experience as a writer, editor and publicist; Maureen Kelleher, a former teacher and education writer with 11 years experience at the school-reform journal Catalyst-Chicago; Elizabeth Duffrin, a writer and editor of education textbooks and award-winning writer at Catalyst-Chicago; and Tiffany Childress, a former NCP organizer in North Lawndale and now a contributor to the scribe team.
The NCP communications team also includes public relations consulting from MK Communications and Valerie Denney Communications; photographers Eric Young Smith and Juan Francisco Hernandez; the multimedia skills of Sarahmaria Gomez and Alex Fledderjohn of TuMultimedia; the graphic design firms Kym Abrams Design and Pinzke Design; and Webitects, the firm that created this web site.
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Auburn Gresham
