{"id":9212,"date":"2023-03-02T19:40:39","date_gmt":"2023-03-02T19:40:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/9thstreetjournal.org\/?p=9212"},"modified":"2023-03-27T15:59:52","modified_gmt":"2023-03-27T15:59:52","slug":"selina-mack-cultivating-lasting-community-one-house-at-a-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/9thstreetjournal.org\/2023\/03\/02\/selina-mack-cultivating-lasting-community-one-house-at-a-time\/","title":{"rendered":"Selina Mack: Cultivating lasting community, one house at a time"},"content":{"rendered":"
Selina Mack nods at the purple and yellow pansies that bloom in front of the tidy Burch Avenue duplex.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThis is important for me, that the yard looks right,\u201d Mack says with a smile. She selected these flowers herself, choosing a variety that could survive through the winter.<\/span><\/p>\n It\u2019s a detail that might have gone unnoticed by a less experienced leader, but after 26 years at Durham Community Land Trustees, Mack has developed a keen eye for the little things. Mack recently retired from her job as executive director of the land trust, where she served as its first Black executive director.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Walk through several Durham neighborhoods, and you\u2019ll see evidence of her impact: in land trust homes like the one on Burch Avenue, in safer streets, and in the lives of hundreds of families who have secure places to live.<\/span><\/p>\n ***<\/span><\/p>\n Mack first became involved with the community land trust movement when she became the land trust\u2019s business manager in 1996. Just 18 months later, in March of 1998, she was tapped as executive director. She went to work renovating homes in Durham\u2019s West End neighborhood.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201c<\/b>That neighborhood was very, very different in 1996, with very substandard housing conditions. Crime was rampant,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd in fact, it was difficult for DCLT to attract people to come live in the houses that we were building or renovating.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Those circumstances \u2014 absentee landlords, boarded-up homes, and unsafe living conditions \u2014 led to the genesis of the Durham land trust in 1987. The organization is among the oldest of the United States\u2019 roughly 260 community land trusts.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n This shared-equity model of housing represents a different approach to the affordable housing puzzle, one that emphasizes permanent affordability. Land trusts buy the land beneath houses, which keeps home prices substantially below market value. When prospective homeowners purchase or rent a home, they do so with the promise of keeping its price low for the future. Originating during the Civil Rights movement, community land trusts became a powerful way for marginalized communities, particularly communities of color, to establish a sense of self-determination.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Today, the land trust continues to fight to preserve Durham\u2019s racial and socioeconomic diversity. The organization now owns and manages 367 properties scattered across seven neighborhoods: West End, Lyon Park, Burch Avenue, Morehead Hill, Lakewood Park, East Durham, and Southside<\/span>.<\/span> In total, it provides affordable homes to more than 250 adults and 125 youths.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI’m sure there were many times when [Mack] worried about making mortgage payments or payroll, or both, but she got it through,\u201d said Happy Sayre-McCord, the organization\u2019s board president. \u201cAnd that is the kind of person she is. She is tough and persevering, and DCLT, I am certain, is here today because of those qualities.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n ***<\/span><\/p>\n As executive director, she pursued partnerships with other community organizations such as Habitat for Humanity and Self-Help, coordinated multiple sources of funding, and kept up contact with residents. Those who worked alongside her praise her work ethic and her down-to-earth personality.<\/span><\/p>\n Dan Levine, director of real estate at Self-Help, first met Mack nearly 16 years ago when his organization collaborated with the land trust to develop affordable housing in Southwest Central Durham. He described a sense of \u201cquiet servant leadership\u201d Mack brings to her work.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cShe was serious and intense, but she was also really warm and cared a lot about community,\u201d said Levine. \u201cAnd just a nice person to get to know on a personal level.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n The land trust now manages 130 rental properties in the West End neighborhood, including renovated buildings like the Pauli Murray Place, the solar-powered West Park Apartments, and The Court at Carroll for seniors. During her tenure, Mack led the land trust\u2019s expansion into rental housing to serve very low income people, seniors, and people with disabilities.<\/span><\/p>\n Her proudest accomplishment?<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThe fact that you can walk out of the front door of DCLT and you can see people, all times of day or night, walking the street, walking the dog, going to the grocery store, just things that you consider normal, everyday things,\u201d she said. \u201cThat wasn’t always the case.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n ***<\/span><\/p>\n Even after nearly three decades, it\u2019s hard for Mack to step back from her work.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt went by quickly,\u201d she said. \u201cThere was always something that I was building, that I was trying to reach, trying to attain. I mean, when you have 10 people a week calling your office saying, \u2018I desperately need housing\u2019… you can relate to those stories and those issues. And it drove me.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<\/span>Stabilizing a neighborhood like the West End takes time and patience. It\u2019s a challenging process that Mack says unfolds \u201cone house at a time, one block at a time.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n