Jeanne DuBois: Dorchester’s advocate“Power is organized people and organized money,” said Jeanne DuBois as she sat in a small conference room flanked by promotional leaflets and large neighborhood maps. After serving for 20 years as the executive director of the Dorchester Bay Economic Development Corporation (DBEDC), DuBois is tipping her cap to the organization and moving on – but not before documenting every project she has overseen during her tenure.

The neighborhood has undergone dramatic change since the longtime Roslindale resident first set foot on the streets of Dorchester, and for much of that time she has been trying to sustainably build out the area with the community’s interests in mind while always being wary of predatory developers. “Neighborhoods don’t just die, they get flipped,” she said.

DuBois is described by many as a fearless leader whose innovative approach to development rests on the support of the communities she serves. She is confident in her tactics, coworkers say, because she has taken the time to ensure that the residents’ priorities shape the projects that shape their neighborhood.

“She has faith that things will happen, and generally, that’s been the case,” said Daryl Wright, president of the Dorchester Bay board. A member of the board since 2010, Wright is entering his fourth year at its head.

“One of the things that Jeanne has done is move the organization forward, particularly into areas of commercial development,” he said. Of DuBois’s various accomplishments as director, the two most-referenced are the Spire and the Bornstein and Pearl project.

In 2002, the late Mayor Thomas Menino cut the ribbon for the Spire, Inc., headquarters on Bay Street in Savin Hill, an 80,000-square-foot building erected by the graphic design and printing company on the blighted grounds of the old Boston Insulated Wire and Cable factory.

But a more recent showstopper was the Bornstein and Pearl Food Production Small Business Center on Quincy Street. The vacant two-acre former Pearl Meats factory site was an uncertain project when DBEDC bought it initially, Wright said. Considered for mixed-housing stock, that notion took a turn when neighborhood residents shared their priorities with DuBois. “In addition to housing, people wanted jobs,” Wright said.

The DBEDC partnered with the Center in a $15 million gut and overhaul process, creating a system of communal food production and distribution spaces, with CommonWealth Kitchen as the anchor tenant. The complex opened in 2014, featuring a series of food trucks as part of its innovative planning and leaving about half of the building for incubator tenants. And they did get those jobs – 144 of them.

From a development standpoint, DuBois is a proponent of what she calls the “three-legged stool” – mixed income housing, business loans and factories, and organizing locals to build power for the common good. “If you don’t do it together, you’re missing a huge piece of the story,” she said. What she has found over the years is “organizing is good for development, but also development helps energize organization.”

To Joe Kreisberg, president of the Massachusetts Association of CDCs, DuBois has consistently been “one of the most creative and visionary directors we have in the field. She’s willing to deal with the messiness.” DuBois leveraged “the right balance of patience and impatience” to keep a steady hand on the reins of an increasingly complex organization, he said, while maintaining the urgency needed to follow through on major initiatives.

This dogged advocate for Dorchester’s success over the last two decades has a deep resume in the art of organizing communities. Born in Southern California and educated at Stanford, she earned a master’s at the University of Wisconsin before being offered the opportunity to study the same method of community organizing in Chicago as Barack Obama.

DuBois’s fundamental takeaway from her Chicago experience was in the importance of gathering community support, but letting them guide development. “You listen,” she said, “and see that people have to shape their own solutions, that they have to do their own homework, and they get really smart, really fast, together.”

Her community organizing education then took her to Buffalo, and on to Boston in 1979, the year that DBEDC was founded, although the woman and the organization wouldn’t completely connect until years later. In the interim, she focused on church work, spending some seven years building connections and coalitions in Roslindale and Hyde Park as the Director of Association of Churches for Training and Service.
Then, as she puts it, she “started on the mommy track.” DuBois had a daughter and a son while she was continuing to organize with Boston Community Capital.

Twenty years ago she took on the role that would define her in much of the community’s mind: executive director of the DBEDC. Her appointment came during a time of turmoil, and significant obstacles reared their heads during her watch.

“The economic situation in our city and state were less than ideal,” said Charlotte Golar Richie, a former state representative who was then executive director for Boston’s Department of Neighborhood Development (DND). Golar Richie, who knew DuBois’s predecessor, worked closely with the DBEDC’s new director until departing the DND in 2009. After a serious crime wave in the 1990s and, later, the deep economic recession, “the Dorchester/Roxbury end seemed to get the worst of it,” Golar Richie said.

DuBois’s commitment was unflagging as she built out the partnerships that form the core of the program’s influence. Her litany of accomplishments include: increasing the budget, programming, and staffing twice over to 24 staff members and a $3.3 million budget; implementing diverse social programing and growing the community organizing department; overseeing the growth of DBEDC affordable housing production from 300 units to 1,136 units in 20 years at a cost of $215.8 million.

She is particularly proud of the Fairmount Rail Line CDC collaborative effort, which acquired properties along the underperforming rail line, completed 800 new or rehabbed affordable housing units while constructing a pipeline for 700 additional units, and filling 150,000 square feet of commercial space.

“You wouldn’t be able to tell that she isn’t from Dorchester,” said Golar Richie. “She’s exhibited this commitment to the neighborhood, for Dorchester, and a passion for community development.”

Still on the organization’s close horizon are one certain project and one possible project, although they will likely begin in earnest after DuBois has left Dorchester. The development at 65 East Cottage St. is likely years away from construction, according to DBEDC. A notorious eyesore, the seven-story Leon Electric building next to the Uphams Corner commuter line station is a possible project for the DBEDC, DuBois said. “It’s always at the top of residents’ lists,” she said.

For the coming year, DuBois will be serving as a strategic advisor for Dorchester Bay as the organization searches for her replacement. Many are quick to point out what a daunting task that will be. DuBois came into a complicated community, and took on a labor-intensive job while giving deference to local input. More than that, though, said Golar Richie, Jeanne Dubois “was part of a movement for social change. She wanted to see us all live in a better world.”

Jeanne DuBois will be the guest of honor at DBECD’s annual fundraising event on Thurs., Sept. 10 at the Strand Theatre. The program begins with a sponsor reception at 5 p.m. The featured guest artist is Vivian Male, a jazz and R&B vocalist. More information on the event can be found online at dbecd.org.