Lessons from Abroad: Improving the Affordable Housing Crisis
Join us for an event on California’s affordable housing crisis featuring Ben Metcalf, managing director of the Terner Center for Housing Innovation and CED associate research professor in city and regional planning. Ben will share his thoughts coming out of a recent research project in Rome that examined promising Italian social housing initiatives to better understand their applicability to our challenges in the US. Following his talk, there will be a discussion between Ben and Sasha Wisotsky Kergan ’01, California deputy secretary of housing. Together, they will explore the implications of Ben's research for housing initiatives now underway in the Bay Area and statewide. Don't miss this opportunity to learn and engage with experts dedicated to innovative housing solutions.
Hosted by College of Environmental Design Terner Center for Housing Innovation
Speakers:
Ben Metcalf is the managing director of the Terner Center for Housing Innovation, where he leads the expansion and deepening of the center's work addressing housing affordability challenges through rigorous research and policy analysis. He is also the chief executive officer of Terner Labs, a nonprofit organization formed in 2021 to advance the applied innovation work of the Terner Center. Metcalf holds an appointment as associate research professor in UC Berkeley's Department of City & Regional Planning and serves as practice director for the Abbey Master of Real Estate Development + Design program. He has a master's degree in public policy and urban planning from the Harvard Kennedy School and a B.A. from Amherst College.
Sasha (Wisotsky) Kergan was appointed deputy secretary of housing at the Business, Consumer Services and Housing Agency (BCSH) by Governor Gavin Newsom in October 2021. She leads the coordination of housing programs, activities, and investments to preserve and expand affordable housing and address the state’s housing needs. She also represents BCSH on several interagency efforts to advance equity and housing goals and to build more climate-friendly housing faster. She earned a master’s degree in Urban Planning from the University of California, Los Angeles and a bachelor’s degree in Urban and Community Development from the University of California, Berkeley.