Co-Director of Housing Justice

How To Apply

Please send your resume and cover letter to hiring@jacksoncenter.info.

About Marian Cheek Jackson Center

The Marian Cheek Jackson Center for Saving and Making History (MCJC) is a place-based organization working to preserve the future of three historically Black neighborhoods of Chapel Hill and Carrboro N.C. (Northside, Pine Knolls, and Tin-Top neighborhoods). Through an abundance-based approach across all MCJC programs, we fight displacement in these neighborhoods by preserving and sharing neighborhood history, implementing community-designed housing justice strategies, organizing cultural events and celebrations, and empowering local youth to be the next generation of leaders. Our vision is Beloved Community - putting community knowledge, visions, and values first in every aspect of our work.

Read more about the MCJC here: https://jacksoncenter.info/

The MCJC also serves as the primary organization stewarding the Northside Neighborhood Initiative (NNI). The NNI is a community directed, innovative, broad-based partnership effort that has bent the housing market towards justice for over ten years! The initiative has implemented strategies to fight against rising and inequitable property taxes, allowed neighbors to control land, and created a range of affordable housing units within the neighborhoods we serve. Our housing justice team leads the programmatic work of the NNI.

Read more about the NNI here: https://jacksoncenter.info/impact/advocacy-housing-justice/northside-nni/

About the Role

We are seeking a highly organized, persistent, and deeply community-centered Co-Director of Housing Justice. This role will join and co-lead the Housing Justice Team in the Northside Neighborhood Initiative (NNI). The Co-Director will lead the work of community land banking by managing the predevelopment process for properties, creating financial analyses, leading project management for properties acquired into the landbank, managing the research of relevant housing justice policies and models, and developing internal systems that expands the team’s capacity and efficiency.

The Co-Director will work in direct collaboration with the other Co-Director of Housing Justice, the part-time Community Advocacy Specialist, our financial partner, Self-Help Credit Union, and the resident leadership team, the Northside Compass Group. This role requires consistent physical presence in the neighborhoods and will include a few evening and weekend hours a month to meet the schedule and rhythm of the community.

Responsibilities

Community Landbanking

• Be the point person on the housing team around real estate, land use planning, housing development, financial analysis, and data management.
• Proactively evaluate potential property acquisitions through mapping options that include the history of home(s), importance to the community, renovation/new construction, zoning and entitlement requirements, site and utility constraints, financial feasibility, potential future uses, and other emerging factors.
• Enhance and maintain data tracking systems, prepare project concepts, and develop decision-making frameworks to support the Compass Group in making decisions and devising strategies to fight back against displacement in their neighborhoods.
• Manage acquisition process as needed, including due diligence items like ordering comparative market analyses, appraisals, surveys, etc.
• Collaborate with the NNI Construction Manager to develop scopes of work for property renovations

Real Estate Development Project Management

• Manage the development of landbank homes from acquisition to disposition
• Monitor development budgets and project timelines
• Lead the predevelopment of landbank properties, through collaborating with relevant external partners, and finding creative solutions to challenging land-use scenarios.
• Guide families who are buying market rate homes through the landbank through the pre-closing process.
• Manage work scopes and coordination of repair subcontractors, with possibility of taking on management of the home repair program

Systems, Operations, and Development

• Support fundraising efforts by tracking program activities, leading reporting on housing justice goals, developing better ways to measure impact, and communicating success to external partners and funders.
• Lead data analysis and tracking within the home repair program

Housing Justice Advocacy

• Provide guidance or ability to quickly research and produce information to lead community advocacy around land-use and policy issues
• Respond to emerging processes that directly affect community residents (ex. Land Use Management Ordinance rewrite, Northside Conservation District revisions, affordable housing bond advocacy, tax valuations, variance applications, etc.)

Experience and Skills

• Strong organizational and project management skills, with the ability to juggle multiple projects and work independently to meet goals and deadlines
• Demonstrated commitment to racial and socio-economic justice
• Proactive, detail-oriented, and creative problem-solving approach to complex projects
• Strong written and verbal communication skills for wide range of audiences
• Experience leading or collaborating with a diverse group of external partners and stakeholders

Strong Drive to Quickly Learn

• Zoning, land use, and urban planning processes and financial projections.
• Researching real estate deeds and reviewing legal documents (ex. deeds, deed restrictions, surveys, contracts, leases, etc).
• Participating in community-based initiatives with diverse and primarily underserved populations.

This role is great for someone who is:

Listening-centered: You model patience. You listen to a wide variety of voices, including your own. You believe in the power of listening as the primary mode of community work.

Love learning through doing: You are comfortable with being in the gray. You can sit with the discomfort of not knowing and are able to keep going to find the answer.

Team Player: Someone who loves to contribute to a team by performing their role at the highest level.

Confident researcher: You are a fast learner who loves to dive deeply into a new topic, thoroughly interrogate it, and structure your research to produce compelling data and arguments. You are willing to fully learn about a situation in order to take decisive action based on the information you gather. You can make recommendations knowing your understanding of an issue is rock-solid.

Creative, Persistent, and Adaptable: If one solution doesn’t work, you are able to step back and create another solution to overcome an obstacle. You can approach an issue from multiple directions in order to find a path forward. You think flexibly and are able to adapt in order to find wins. In doing research, you can continue to patiently follow a thread until you get the information you need.

Interest in policy, real estate, and land-use: You see the connections between policy, real estate, financing, land-use and how they impact historically African American communities. You are excited to learn and apply it in order to benefit the neighborhoods.

A knack for details and organization: You enjoy understanding the minutiae. You can find ways to organize data that works best for your team. You are meticulous in the details.

Project manager: You can take a large project, break it into smaller components, and guide it from start to finish, delegating tasks, managing timelines and budgets, in order to lead the project team to success.

Skilled Translator: You can translate housing technical concepts into the core of what residents care about or are willing to learn the language of the Housing Team.

Accountable: You model leadership and are willing to take responsibility, good or bad. You work well both independently and with a team, and pursue work that you are proud of. You embrace hard conversations as pathways for individual and collective learning.

Benefits: Medical, Dental, and Vision Coverage; Generous holiday and vacation leave

Job Type: 32 hours/week

Location: Hybrid role (at least two in-office days in Chapel Hill, NC)

Fluency in English is required.

Proficiency in Arabic, Burmese, Cantonese, Karen, Korean, Mandarin, and/or Spanish is a plus.