Susan M. Ifill

Susan M. Ifill is executive vice president and chief operating officer for NeighborWorks America, leading programs and staff who support network and field operations. She previously served as chief executive officer of Neighborhood Housing Services of New York City (NHSNYC), a NeighborWorks network organization, working to address affordable housing and fight displacement across New York City. Prior to joining NHSNYC, Ifill was the senior vice president and chief retail officer for Carver Federal Savings Bank in New York.

Marietta Rodriguez

Marietta Rodriguez knows what it’s like to be a new homebuyer because she was one. "I was 25 and living in a high-cost area," she says. “There was absolutely no way I could buy a home without someone holding my hand and walking me through it.” The folks holding her hand were from a NeighborWorks network organization that provided counseling and financial assistance to first-time homebuyers. Soon, Rodriguez went to work for the organization that assisted her so that she could help more people in her hometown.

In Lincoln, Nebraska, Tim Rinne and Kay Walter launched an urban gardening movement in their Hawley neighborhood. In an area classified as a food desert, the couple devised a plan to increase access to fresh, healthy produce, while also developing a way to bring their neighbors closer together. The idea formed about 10 years ago when Tim became increasingly more concerned about how climate change could potentially affect the food supply.

"Alexa?" a retired resident says to the digital assistant sitting on the table. "Tell me a joke."

Alexa, a cloud-based voice service, might respond with the one about the cat who stopped playing basketball. (Why? He threw up too many hairballs.) Or the one about how people survived before sandpaper. (They roughed it.)

Older residents living in the communities built and maintained by St. Mary Development in Dayton, Ohio, were afraid to leave home – and had been advised not to. They were concerned about public transportation. They were advised not to go to grocery stores. But they needed food. A number of organizations partnered to get it to them.
 

Housing is on everyone's lips, says Sheila Rice, who just completed a term as interim executive vice president and chief operating officer for NeighborWorks America. She expects the trend to continue through 2020. 

For starters, the health-care industry is highlighting housing, Rice says, pointing to a quote that is everywhere from the Champlain Housing Trust to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: "Housing is health care." 

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