About the Authors

From the Editor Jill Susanne Shook:

As the director of STARS (Students and Tutors Achieving Real Success) at Lake Avenue Church in Pasadena, I traveled across the US to inner city ministries to learn how to better serve our 100 plus students. I couldn’t help but notice that most of these ministries, in addition to their after school programs, had amazing affordable housing ministries. Considering the national housing crisis our country is facing, I wondered if US churches were aware of what God was doing across our landscape to address the profound and complex ills this crisis is producing. This led to the editing and writing of Making Housing Happen: Faith Based Affordable Housing Models.

I’m in awe of the amazing practitioners who have created the many award winning ‘best practice’ models featured in this book. They wrote of their own journey into affordable housing, how their congregations became engaged, how they funded their projects, and of the realities and lessons learned.
~ Jill Suzanne Shook

ROGER BAIRSTOW is chair of Snake River Housing, an affordable farmworker housing organization in Washington State. He’s also the director of Mano à Mano, a nonprofit organization dedicated to asset building for low-income and disadvantaged populations. He was assistant professor with Oregon State University Extension Service, where he initiated micro-enterprise programming and directed a local leadership program for low-income and minority populations. Roger has worked in Oregon, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, implementing community economic development programs, and has conducted international development work in Senegal, Kenya, Guatemala and Costa Rica.

J. R. BERGDOLL JR., was project manager of the Temescal Cohousing Project during its development and construction, and remains an active owner. Mr. Bergdoll is currently housing development director for Habitat for Humanity-East Bay, managing site acquisition and project development in the Oakland area. He earned a B.S. in Architecture from the University of Virginia and a Master of City Planning from the University of California, Berkeley. He worked for the San Francisco Planning Department in urban design, neighborhood planning, and project review and was a leader of church missions for Rockridge United Methodist Church in Oakland, California.

MARIAN BRAY has authored more than twenty books and more than 150 stories with various publishers, including David C. Cook, Chariot Books, Scholastic, Zondervan, Harold Shaw Publishers, Tyndale House, Doubleday, and Augsburg Press, and in various Christian and secular magazines. Marian was a college instructor with the Children’s Institute of Literature, Learning Tree University in California, and Biola University, and has instructed workshops at various writing conferences. Marian lives with her husband and daughter Piper, along with horses, dogs, cats, guinea pigs, and chickens on the high desert in New Mexico.

TERRY CARTER works for Century Housing, one of the largest affordable housing agencies in Southern California. She attended Biola University and graduated from California State University at Fullerton. She has worked for two international relief and development agencies, World Vision, and Food for the Hungry. She actively participates in community-organizing efforts through her church’s membership in One L.A., the Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF) affiliate in Los Angeles. She is part of the One L.A. Housing Strategy Team.

SHANE CLAIBORNE is founding partner of The Simple Way (www.thesimpleway.org), a radical faith community that lives among the homeless in Kensington, North Philadelphia. Shane graduated from Eastern University, and studied at Princeton Seminary. He spent a ten-week stint with Mother Teresa and a year at Willow Creek Community Church near Chicago. Shane serves on the board of directors for the Christian Community Development Association. He writes and travels extensively, speaking about peacemaking, social justice, and Jesus. Zondervan recently published his book, The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical

LISA TREVINO CUMMINS is president and founder of Urban Strategies in Arlington, Virginia (www.urbanstrategies.us), which connects, resources, and tools nonprofit organizations to affect change among communities in need. Recently she launched a three-year, $10 million national project, Reclamando Nuestro Futuro/Reclaiming Our Future, that resources Latino grassroots organizations to impact the lives of at-risk and adjudicated youth. She served in the White House Office for Faith-Based and Community Initiatives as associate director, leading several Cabinet-level agencies in program design and strategic alliances within the faith community. She also served as senior vice president of Community Development in one of the country’s largest financial institutions.

MILLARD FULLER is founder and former president of Habitat for Humanity International, one of the top twenty house builders in the United States. In 2005 he started the Fuller Center for Housing, with offices in Americus, Georgia. Habitat has helped more than 125,000 families in more than 3,000 U.S. cities and 82 other countries. More than 625,000 people now have safe, decent, affordable shelter because of Habitat’s global work. Author of nine books about his life and work with Habitat for Humanity, Fuller received the Medal of Freedom from President Clinton in 1996 and was named the 1995 Builder of the Year by Professional Builder magazine. Fuller continues to receive honorary doctorates and achievement awards for his leadership toward meeting the goal of eliminating poverty housing worldwide.

JOHN HEINEMEIER was pastor of the Resurrection Lutheran Church, Roxbury, Massachusetts, and has a Masters in Sacred Theology from Concordia Seminary in St. Louis. He served four growing and vital congregations in New York for more than thirty-one years. He helped create powerful church-based citizens’ groups: East Brooklyn Congregations and South Bronx Churches. These two organizations have now built some 4,000 owner-occupied Nehemiah Homes for the working class and have established three high-achieving alternative public high schools. In 1994, Pastor Heinemeier assisted in establishing The Greater Boston Interfaith Organization, called by the Boston Globe (March 19, 2000), “the strongest grassroots political force this area has seen since the 1970’s.”

MARY KING is an investment consultant in Beverly Hills, California. She holds the first B.A. degree awarded in Economics and Religion (with honors) from Harvard University, where she specialized in ethics in finance and socially responsible investing. She is the author of academic research published in The Journal of Investing and several articles in popular magazines, including Christianity Today. Mary serves on the boards of the Foundation for Christian Stewardship and Floresta and is a contributing editor to Prism, a publication of Evangelicals for Social Action. She also has worked for KLD Inc. & Co., a premier research firm tracking corporate ethics.

DARYN KOBATA is an editor and writer with great interest in poverty issues. Most recently editor of California Institute of Technology’s award-winning faculty and staff newspaper, Daryn has also had articles published in Charisma and World Christian magazines and the World Pulse missions newsletter. She also has been a writer with Food for the Hungry in Africa, Asia, and the U.S., and with World Relief in Darfur, Sudan (2005). She earned her B.A. in English at the University of California-Davis and is completing her M.A. in theology at Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena, California.

ANDY KRUMSIEG is cofounder and the current director of the Jubilee Christian Development Corporation in St. Louis and the Jubilee Community Church, along with Pastor Leroy Gill Jr. He graduated from Wheaton College, majoring in biblical studies. Andy served at Lawndale Community Church in Chicago and was the director of St. Louis World Impact. His wife, Debbie, grew up in the Congo as the daughter of missionaries. They have four children, Ben, Christy, Aaron and Caleb. Caleb, born in St. Louis, is the sixth generation of Andy’s family living in the same neighborhood.

DR. ROBERT C. LINTHICUM is president of Partners in Urban Transformation in California (www.piut.org), which equips the church for engagement in public life. Dr. Linthicum is Distinguished Professor Emeritus at Eastern University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and adjunct faculty at the Claremont School of Theology in California. He directed the Office of Urban Advance for World Vision International. Ordained with the Presbyterian Church (USA) he was a pastor in Milwaukee, Detroit, Rockford (Ill.) and Chicago. More than 17,000 pastors, mission leaders, and students from more than seventy cities in twenty-one countries have participated in 120 urban ministry consultations and workshops led by Dr. Linthicum since 1986. He authored seven books, most recently, Transforming Power: Biblical Strategies for Making A Difference In Your Community.

BOB LUPTON is founder and president of FCS Urban Ministries (www.fcsministries.org), a community development organization in Atlanta. For the past thirty-five years he has lived and served in the inner-city, where he has created a wide range of human services, developed mixed-income subdivisions, organized a multi-racial congregation, started businesses, and created housing for hundreds of families. He has a Ph.D. in psychology from The University of Georgia and is the author of four books on urban ministry.

ED MAHONEY works to create a healthy home environment for abused and emotionally disturbed children at the residential Hillsides Home for Children in Southern California. He earned degrees in Religious Studies and English at Westmont College, Santa Barbara. In 1994 he completed his Master’s from Regents College in Canada.

DON MINER has twenty years experience in property management and trust real estate at two major banks—Bank of America and Wells Fargo. With a degree in economics from Cal State University Los Angeles, he sees his profession as a ministry helping clients to recognize and meet their housing needs. His passion has always centered on human rights issues, and social and economic conditions throughout the world. He is currently focusing on the discussion pertaining to the Kurds in the Middle East.

EDWARD F. MONCRIEF is the executive director of Neighborhood Housing Services Silicon Valley (www.nhssv.org). He was a Franciscan friar, living in the Old Missions of California. After leaving seminary, he earned a Master’s of Social Work, and has studied law, real estate, and finance. He is a published writer and poet. He spent thirty-five-years directing nonprofit housing development and housing finance organizations. He was the director of El Porvenir, a self-help housing program launched by the American Friends Service Committee with farmworkers of the San Joaquin Valley. As founding executive director of Community Housing Improvement Systems and Planning Association, Inc. (CHISPA), he worked for the development of more than seven hundred homes for farmworker families of the Salinas Valley.

MARY NELSON is founder and President Emeritus of Bethel New Life, a faith-based community development corporation on Chicago’s low-income west side. Bethel has developed more than 1,100 units of affordable housing and has brought more than $100 million of new investments into the credit-starved community. She serves on the boards of Call to Renewal, Christian Community Development Corporation, and Good City, and is past board president of Woodstock Institute and National Congress of Community Economic Development. She has her Ph.D. from Union Graduate School, and is now doing consulting and teaching. www.bethelnewlife.org

BERT NEWTON serves as an associate pastor at Pasadena Mennonite Church in Pasadena, California, is a staff associate for Mennonite Central Committee (as a peace and justice educator), and is on the steering committee for Affordable Housing Action (AHA). He has taught Bible courses for Heston College and the Center for Anabaptist Leadership. He earned his M.Div. at Fuller Seminary.

LOWELL NOBLE was called into missions in Appalachia. He received his M.A. in religion from Seattle Pacific College and a B.A. in anthropology and M.A. in anthropology from Wheaton College. He received a Specialist in Arts Degree (like a mini-Ph.D.) in 1975, then taught sociology and anthropology at Spring Arbor College. Now he and his wife, Dixie, volunteer six months of the year at Antioch Community in Jackson, Mississippi, working closely with Dr. John Perkins as the training (education) director for the Spencer Perkins Center. www.jmpf.org/download.html

SUSAN P. ORTMEYER is a writer living in Pasadena, California, with her husband, John Neff, a scientist. Susan has an active interest in issues affecting the poor. She graduated from University of California-Berkeley in 1987 with a B.A. in history; and from UCL.A Law School in 1993. Susan worked for ten years as a labor and employment lawyer, and for four years specializing in employment discrimination investigations. She was the legal director with Public Interest Investigations, Inc., then began a career as a writer, potter, and homemaker.

JILL SHOOK is a doctoral candidate in “Transformational Leadership for the Global City” at Bakke Graduate School in Seattle, Washington. Jill earned an M.A. in biblical studies from Denver Seminary. Jill has designed and implemented numerous programs that connect people across diverse economic and ethnic backgrounds. While working for Food for the Hungry she brought teams from Berkeley to Harvard into developing nations. She began STARS, Students and Tutors Achieving Real Success, a ministry of Lake Avenue Church, in Pasadena, California, bringing together hundreds of parishioners and at-risk neighborhood children. She is now engaged with organizing churches in Pasadena around those issues that are affecting the most vulnerable and serves as the Asset Manager for the Cambria Apartment (Chapter 7). She is an active board member for Golden Rule Affordable Housing Trust Fund, and Pasadena Neighborhood Housing Services.

TOM AND CHRISTINE SINE are the cofounders of Mustard Seed Associates, which encourages Christians to create imaginative new models of life and faith including new forms of housing, community, and lifestyle. Tom is a consultant in futures research and planning for both Christian and secular organizations. He has authored many books, earning the CBA’s Gold Medallion Award and Christianity Today’s book of the year list in 1996. Christine is an Australian physician who developed and directed the healthcare ministry for YWAM’s Mercy Ships, and has also written several books. They coauthored Living on Purpose: Finding God’s Best for Your Life. They are adjunct professors for Fuller Theological Seminary in Seattle.

PAUL A. SMITH serves with InnerChange, a Christian order among the poor. InnerChange ministries flow from relationships formed when teams move into poor neighborhoods. The emergence of local leaders in Los Angeles resulted in Comunidad Cambria, a tenant-controlled nonprofit corporation. Comunidad Cambria received the National Association of Professional Organizers Community Service Award in 1995 and Southern California Association of Non-Profit Housing Project of the Year in 1998. Mr. Smith has an A.B. from Harvard University and a M.S. from the California Institute of Technology.

RONALD SPANN was rector of Church of the Messiah for twenty-five years in Detroit. The parish spread faith-based development through its Housing Corporation. Spann led the effort to form the Islandview Village Development Corporation. He is director of Christ Church Grosse Pointe Spirituality Center and on the faculty of CREDO, a clergy wellness initiative. He is a charter member of the Christian Community Development Association and serves on its advisory board.

RAY STRANSKE earned degrees from Biola University and Denver Seminary. He co-founded Hope Communities, Inc., which has built or renovated more than 650 units of affordable housing in the urban Denver area. Ray is an active member of the Five Points Business Association, and board member of Housing For All, Colorado Housing Consortium, US Bank Community Advisory Board, and the Enterprise Foundation network (since its inception in 1982). Ray is also active with many state and local housing development associations, such as Colorado Housing Affordable Partnership, and Colorado Housing Now. www.hopecommunities.org

MARILYN STRANSKE is president and national organizer of Christians Supporting Community Organizing (www.cscoweb.org), an effort to involve Evangelical and Pentecostal congregations in faith-based community organizing. She has addressed more than 400 national and regional leaders. Marilyn earned a B.S. from Northwestern University and a M.Ed. from Georgia State University. She co-founded Hope Communities with her husband, Ray. She is a board member and an associate with Partners in Urban Transformation www.piut.org. The Stranskes met in an urban church in 1974 in the neighborhood where they still live. The joys of their lives are children, Jon and Clarissa, their church, St. John’s Episcopal Church, and travel.

DR. LEE STUART directed SBC Nehemiah—the development entity of South Bronx Churches. She was lead organizer of South Bronx Churches Sponsoring Committee, Inc., a broad-based organization affiliated with the Industrial Areas Foundation, which is a primary force changing social conditions in the South Bronx since 1987. Lee received her Ph.D. in Ecology from San Diego State University and the University of California (Davis) and completed postdoctoral work at Virginia Tech in biology. She founded SHARE—Self Help and Resource Exchange, an ecumenical food assistance and community development program that serves 11,000 families per month throughout the United States, Mexico and Guatemala.

RICHARD TOWNSELL is the executive director of the Lawndale Christian Community Development Corporation (www.lcdc.net ), and has overseen 30 million dollars of affordable housing development. He and LCDC have received more than a dozen awards for their housing development including the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (2001) as the Community Builder of the Year; the Leadership for a Changing World Award from the Ford Foundation (2003); and a National Award for Social Justice Leadership (2004). He was named the Distinguished Fellow at the twentieth anniversary of Leadership Greater Chicago. He holds degrees from Northwestern University, Spertus College in Chicago (M.A. in urban housing development) and a Certificate in Business Administration from the University of Illinois-Chicago’s Business School. He is an adjunct faculty member of Northwestern University, Wheaton College, and the University of Illinois at Chicago.

REV. DR. DARELL T. WEIST has been a campus minister; theological professor in Sierra Leone, West Africa; church administrator; local pastor; and foundation president. He is now the president and CEO of a faith-based affordable housing corporation. The corporation’s housing has received a prestigious Southern California award from Union Bank. Rev. Weist has a B. S. from Westmar College, Le Mars, Iowa; a M. Div from Garret Evangelical Theological Seminary in Evanston, Illinois; and a Rel. D. from Claremont School of Theology in Claremont, California.