J. Max Bond, Jr. Lecture | Architects’ Renewal Committee in Harlem (ARCH) @ 60

Join the New York Chapter of the National Organization of Minority Architects (nycoba|NOMA), the J. Max Bond Center of City University of New York, and the AIANY Diversity and Inclusion Committee for the annual J. Max Bond Jr. Lecture. Established in 2010, this design talk honors the memory of J. Max Bond, Jr., FAIA, NOMA, an architect, partner at Davis Brody Bond, advocate, teacher, and trailblazer of his time. The lecture addresses issues that were important to Bond: equity, inclusive design, communities, and global cultures, in particular Ghana and Africa at large.

This year’s Bond lecture coincides with the 60th anniversary of the founding of the Architects’ Renewal Committee in Harlem (ARCH), which was created to serve the planning and urban design needs of Harlem residents. Once led by J. Max Bond, former dean of the architecture school at The City College of New York, the group was formed by planners and architects who wanted to ensure that residents were the ones shaping their community’s future. The ARCH at 60 presentation will use several of ARCH’s projects—ARCH itself as a model for community design centers everywhere, its advocacy and organizing work on housing and tenant’s rights, and visions for 125th Street that countered the plan for the State Office Building—as starting points for conversations about Harlem’s transformation physically and demographically amidst ongoing development, including the need for more affordable housing, and the fight for neighborhood autonomy.

The lecture is a keynote and kickoff to a full day conference ARCH @ 60 taking place on Saturday, November 16—register for the conference here.

Speakers:
Dr. Seumalu Elora Lee Raymond, Director, Ph.D. Program and Associate Professor, City & Regional Planning at Georgia Institute of Technology
Moses Gates, Vice President, Housing and Neighborhood Planning, Regional Plan Association

About the Speakers:
Dr. Seumalu Elora Raymond is an urban planner and Associate Professor in the School of City and Regional Planning in the College of Design at Georgia Tech. She is interested in the financialization of housing and property in land, displacement and dispossession through housing systems, housing and disasters, and housing justice. Dr. Raymond has explored widening housing wealth inequality following the real estate and financial crises of the 2000s, and the relationship between financialization of rental housing and eviction-led displacement. Dr. Raymond has ongoing projects on housing, displacement and disasters, including work on eviction and migration following disasters.

Dr. Raymond has testified before the House Committee on Ways and Means, the House Committee on Financial Services, and has presented for HUD’s PD&R Quarterly. She has published articles in Human Progress in Geography, Urban Geography, Cityscape, JPER, Housing Studies, and the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta’s Community and Economic Development Discussion Paper Series. Her research has been awarded Best Paper Award from Housing Policy Debate, and Best Conference Paper from the Journal of Urban Affairs. Her research has been featured in the New York Times, the New York Times Magazine, the Washington Post, the Economist, Bloomberg’s Businessweek, NPR’s Morning Edition, ABC’s Good Morning America, Telemundo, Univision, and Radio New Zealand, among other news outlets.

Moses Gates is Regional Plan Association’s Vice President for Housing and Neighborhood Planning, leading the organization’s planning, research and advocacy efforts in affordable housing, economic development, and urban design. He also leads RPA’s efforts to build international partnerships.

Since joining RPA in 2016, Gates has led RPA’s recommendations on affordability, economic development, and livable neighborhoods for the Fourth Regional Plan and authored or overseen several reports on housing policy and neighborhood planning. Prior to joining RPA, he was director of planning and community development for the Association for Neighborhood Housing Development, where he initiated New York City’s first Community Development Fellowship program.

Gates also has worked for New York City’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development, as a nonprofit affordable housing developer, as a licensed New York City tour guide, and as a visiting assistant professor at the Pratt Institute. He serves as vice president of the board of directors for Neighborhood Housing Services of New York City. He has a master’s of urban planning from Hunter College, a bachelor’s in history from the University of Wisconsin, and is the author of the memoir ​“Hidden Cities” (Tarcher/Perigee 2013).