Our Team
BOARD
Alma Chislom, President
Alma is a BNCLT resident and leader. She coordinates the Stewardship Committee, connecting BNCLT board members, the property management company and the residents of our properties. Her association with the land trust started when she lived in a home that was in foreclosure and in threat of being auctioned. Her property is now part of BNCLT. It is her hope to give back to her community and those who have helped her and her family through organizing in her community to end displacement. When not organizing or teaching peers on housing issues, Alma works as a team leader in the healthcare field. She has raised 5 children in Dorchester.
Cindy Heraldo
Cindy Heraldo lives on Park Street close to one of BNCLT’s buildings. She runs a childcare business, works as a beauty consultant, and has been active in her community for a long time. Originally from Trinidad, Cindy has lived in Boston for over 24 years. Cindy is a natural leader. She has taken a lead role with her neighbors and BNCLT to activate the vacant lot next to her building. She is always coming up with creative ideas for things to do in the lot, and has been a fantastic steward of the garden the neighborhood has created over the last 2 years.
Cortina Vann
Cortina is a Community Organizer with Massachusetts Affordable Housing Alliance (MAHA) in Dorchester, Massachusetts. She has been working with MAHA’s grassroots group of community members since 1999, and has over eleven years working for financial service organizations. At MAHA, she has staffed campaigns that have led to an increase in the city of Boston’s linkage fee and establishment of an inclusionary development policy, as well as helping to pass the Community Preservation Act (CPA). Cortina is a supporter and volunteer with the Black Economic Justice Institute and member of the Blue Hills Corridor Commission. Before coming to MAHA, she worked at Fleet Bank underwriting small business loans. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, Cortina grew up in Roxbury. She received her B.A. in Business Administration: Accounting & Management at George Washington University’s Mount Vernon Campus. She is committed to BNCLT to make sure that low to moderate-income working-class individuals and families have options on where they choose to live and not be displaced from their homes.
Denise Matthews
Denise Matthews-Turner is the Interim Executive Director of City Life/Vida Urbana (CLVU), becoming Interim ED in January of this year. Founded in 1973, City Life works for racial, social, and economic justice and gender equity by fighting displacement and building community power. Before becoming Interim ED, Denise was City Life’s Director of Administration. Part of her work the past 2 years has been supporting the leadership development of Black women leaders in our movement through co-facilitating the Black Feminist Praxis Circle.
Denise is a fabric artist and leads CLVU’s Arts and Culture Committee. A native of New Jersey, Denise is a graduate of Boston University.
Eloise P. Lawrence, Clerk
Eloise has been a proud member of BNCLT- formerly COHIF- since 2015. She is an Assistant Clinical Professor of Law at Harvard Law School and the Deputy Faculty Director of the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau (HLAB). HLAB was one of the founding members of BNCLT that was created in response to the massive displacement occurring from the foreclosure crisis. Lawrence has been working to defend homeowners and tenants since the start of the foreclosure crisis in 2008, when she was working for Greater Boston Legal Services, another founding member of BNCLT. In her current practice, she represents families who are being displaced from their homes and communities due to gentrification and speculation. In addition to protecting tenants in the courts, she, along with her students, works closely with community organizers to ensure tenants realize their collective power. She started her legal career working on civil rights issues in Chicago Public Housing as a Skadden Fellow. She received a J.D. from Northwestern University School of Law in 2002 and a B.A. from Stanford University in 1995.
Eric Boyd
Eric was born and raised in Boston. After being priced out of the South End, he moved to Somerville, where he lived for 20 years. He then moved to Dorchester 16 years ago. Eric was one of the residents who organized to win 6 Humphreys Place after years of legal battles between tenants and the landlord who had sent them no-fault eviction notices. Through their organizing, the tenants prevailed, winning a collective bargaining agreement that allowed them to stay in their homes, which became a permanent reality once BNCLT purchased the building in 2022.
Following the tenant victory, Eric says: “Don’t give up or give in, ‘cause when we fight, we win. I’m living proof.”
Erica Schwarz
Erica comes to BNCLT with a determination to address the ever worsening housing crisis and with the belief that the only way to create lasting justice is through community organizing and grassroots action. Erica lives in Fields Corner and is active with Dorchester Not for Sale. Professionally, Erica has served as the Community Organizer and then Executive Director of WATCH Community Development Corporation in Waltham, the Executive Director of Southwest Boston CDC in Hyde Park, and as a Program Officer with LISC. Currently, Erica is the Community Project Manager with the Cambridge Redevelopment Authority, advancing real estate projects that support the sustainability of nonprofit services in Cambridge.
Gregory Bialecki, Treasurer
Gregory joined the board of BNCLT (formerly COHIF) in 2015, bringing over 30 years of experience in real estate development within both the public and private sectors. Prior to joining Redgate, where Greg serves now as Principal, Greg served as Cabinet Secretary for the Executive Office of Housing and Economic Development for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and was actively engaged in promoting mixed-use transit-oriented developments that included multifamily housing. Under Greg’s leadership, his office received the Robert C. Larson Workforce Housing Public Policy Award from the Urban Land Institute in 2013.
Jean Paul Doh
Jean Paul Doh is a native from Ivory Coast, West Africa and a longtime Somerville homeowner and real estate broker. After his first year in Dorchester, he and every renter in his building was met with a no fault eviction notice. From that day on he became an active member of City Life/Vida Urbana (CLVU) to fight for affordable housing along with HLAB in a 4 year long trial that they won!
Jean Paul Doh has always been a firm believer in fighting for what is right and never backing down even when the odds weren’t in his favor. He taught this lesson to his 5 children and exemplified this while helping organizing the 2008 Obama campaign in Somerville and Cambridge. Jean Paul is retired now but he is not finished. He is proud to be a new member of BNCLT.
Joceline Fidalgo
Joceline Fidalgo is a life-long resident of North Dorchester and has been active in local community organizing since she was a teenager. She was a staff member at the Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative for over 8 years, where she served as the Director of Development and Deputy Director. While at DSNI, she led fundraising and organizational development efforts. Seeing the success of the Dudley Neighbors Inc land trust and others in the Greater Boston area have made her very excited about what can be accomplished when community members control land and housing in their neighborhoods. She sees the CLT model as one of the few viable options for fighting displacement and ensuring community control over local development. She is excited to help contribute to BNCLTs growth. She is also an amazing mom to 3yr old, Zaia Maria.
Joel Wool
A native of the Bay State, Joel Wool has lived in Dorchester since 2011. Joel is very committed to cooperative models of land and housing and excited to contribute to BNCLTs work. He has worked in the fields of environmental advocacy, housing, local government and public health. His neighborhood involvement includes serving on the board of the Dot House Health and support for the Dorchester Community Food Cooperative. For his day job, Joel is the Chief of Staff at BHA, working mostly on strategic initiatives. Before that, he was the Policy Director for City Councilor Lydia Edwards after many years working on environmental justice and climate change. He is a graduate of Emerson College and Tufts University. Joel is also an alumnus of AmeriCorps and the JOIN for Justice Fellowship.
Kathy Brown
Kathy is one of the founding members of COHIF, Inc, and has helped steward our transition to BNCLT, Inc. She has been a long-time leader in the housing justice movement in Boston. Kathy serves as the Coordinator of Boston Tenants Coalition, and has played a key role in tenants' rights campaigns. She also serves on the board of JPNDC.
Susan Chihambakwe
Susan is a BNCLT resident and active leader. She participated in the CLT Ambassador program, and brings a commitment to leadership and peer learning to share BNCLT's model. Susan is passionate about protecting tenants’ rights, and actively supports tenants in Boston who face eviction, including regularly accompanying tenants in housing court. Susan plays a big role in helping with public policy at Rosie’s Place. She is an artist by trade, dedicating her talents to making clothes and jewelry.
STAFF
Meridith Levy, Executive Director
mlevy@bnclt.org | 617-237-6044
Meridith Levy joined BNCLT in January, 2020 as BNCLT’s Executive Director. She brings 20 years of experience from the community development sector, with a background in community organizing and planning, and organizational management-- focusing on social and economic equity, anti-displacement, and land use. Meridith began her organizing career in Minnesota using the Community Reinvestment Act to hold banks accountable to family farmers. She led numerous community planning initiatives and organizing campaigns in Fitchburg, MA and Somerville, MA, helping to win passage of Somerville’s Community Preservation Act; increased Inclusionary Zoning to 20%; and establishment of Somerville’s Jobs Linkage Fee. As Deputy Director of Somerville Community Corporation from 2013-2020, Meridith helped create and oversee SCC’s First Source Jobs Program and the Social Equity Campaign. Meridith studied emerging approaches to community capital and finance as a LISC Rubinger Fellow in 2018. She is excited to be a part of the BNCLT team to help build grassroots power and explore creative acquisition strategies for housing justice through the CLT model.
MA and MS from Tufts University: Urban and Environmental Policy and Agriculture, Food and the Environment
Markeisha Moore, Resident Leadership Coordinator
Markeisha Moore is a community organizer and advocate focusing on affordable housing (preservation, new build, and policy). She has been part of Dorchester Not 4 Sale (DN4S) for the past five years, and part of the citywide Coalition for a Truly Affordable Boston (CTAB) for almost as long. She has also been a part of multiple community projects including helping shape BNCLT's Membership proposal.
Louisa Winchell, Program Coordinator
Louisa Winchell first started working with BNCLT as a Tisch Fellow in the summer of 2022 – as a Tufts MA Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning student. For two years, she worked part-time doing BNCLT’s communications and supporting fundraising and events. She also assisted BNCLT as the Property Transfer Project Coordinator with the Greater Boston CLT Network. As BNCLT’s Program Coordinator, she supports BNCLT’s fundraising, communications, membership, and other BNCLT programs. This includes developing BNCLT’s asset building / rent-to-own program; and BNCLT’s property transfer program. As someone who grew up in the area, she is honored to support the growth and stewardship of community-controlled permanently affordable housing in Boston.
CONSULTANTS
Adrian R. Carillo and Adrian R. Carrillo Jr., Financial Consultants
Adrian R Carrillo and Adrian R Carrillo Jr. are working with BNCLT as financial consultants. Adrian Sr. started Carrillo Business Services over 20 years ago and has been a trusted advisor as CFO to small businesses and non-profits, the role he continues to play for BNCLT. Adrian Jr. is providing Controller services to BNCLT. He has been with Carrillo Business Services for 14 years and obtained the IRS Enrolled Agent license in 2019.
Loryn Sheffner, Real Estate Consultant
Loryn Sheffner, Principal of Avenue Development, has worked as a community development real estate practitioner for over 20 years, often for not-for-profit or public sector clients. She has been sharing her expertise with BNCLT as our real estate consultant.