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Councilmember Brad Lander has spent his career standing up for affordable, livable, and sustainable communities in Brooklyn and throughout New York City. As executive director of an award-winning community development organization and one of city’s leading public policy advocates, Lander has created and preserved thousands of units of affordable housing, strengthened local small businesses, and helped thousands of low-income New Yorkers find living wage jobs. Lander was elected to the New York City Council in November 2009. He represents the 39th district in Brooklyn, which includes the neighborhoods of Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens, Columbia Waterfront, Park Slope, Windsor Terrace and Borough Park, and Kensington. Prior to his election to the Council, Lander was the director of the Pratt Center for Community Development, where he worked with community leaders, city government and non-profit organizations to preserve and strengthen neighborhood quality-of-life, promote sustainability, and create opportunity in low-income neighborhoods. At Pratt, Brad led successful campaigns to create NYC’s “inclusionary zoning” program and to require developers seeking tax breaks to set aside 20% of their units for low- and moderate-income families and to pay their building service workers a living wage. Together, these reforms will save the City hundreds of millions of dollars, generate over 20,000 units of affordable housing, and insure thousands of living wage jobs in the years to come. Before joining Pratt, Lander served for a decade as executive director of the Fifth Avenue Committee, a nationally recognized, not-for-profit community-based organization in Brooklyn that develops affordable housing, creates economic opportunities, and organizes tenants and workers. Brad's work at FAC helped to preserve and renovate dozens of neighborhood buildings facing abandonment after the real estate recession of the early 1990s, create several new small businesses, pioneer a successful re-entry program for people returning to the community from prison, and mobilize thousands of residents to work together for a stronger community. Lander also served as the Housing & Community Development chair of Brooklyn's Community Board 6, on the board of directors of the Jewish Funds for Justice and Grassroots Leadership, as policy co-chair of Housing First!, and on several panels advising the City of New York on public policy issues. Lander’s work has been recognized with awards from the Ford Foundation, Fannie Mae Foundation, Do Something, American Planning Association, the Prospect Park YMCA, and New York Magazine. Councilmember Lander holds a Masters in City and Regional Planning from Pratt Institute, a Masters in Social Anthropology from University College London, and a Bachelors degree with honors from the University of Chicago. He teaches community planning, housing, and urban policy in Pratt's graduate city planning department. Lander lives in Park Slope, Brooklyn with his wife, Meg Barnette, the Vice President of Strategic Initiatives at Planned Parenthood NYC, and their children, Marek (who attends Middle School 51) and Rosa (who attends Public School 107).
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