About the Agency:
The New York City Department of Housing Preservation Development (HPD) promotes quality and affordability in the city's housing, and diversity and strength in the city’s neighborhoods because every New Yorker deserves a safe, affordable place to live in a neighborhood they love.
- We maintain building and resident safety and health
- We create opportunities for New Yorkers through housing affordability
- We engage New Yorkers to build and sustain neighborhood strength and diversity.
HPD is entrusted with fulfilling these objectives through the goals and strategies of “Housing Our Neighbors: A Blueprint for Housing and Homelessness,” Mayor Adams’ comprehensive housing framework. To support this important work, the administration has committed $5 billion in new capital funding, bringing the 10-year planned investment in housing to $22 billion the largest in the city’s history. This investment, coupled with a commitment to reduce administrative and regulatory barriers, is a multi-pronged strategy to tackle New York City’s complex housing crisis, by addressing homelessness and housing instability, promoting economic stability and mobility, increasing homeownership opportunities, improving health and safety, and increasing opportunities for equitable growth.
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Your Team:

The Office of Neighborhood Strategies (ONS) is charged with ensuring that HPD’s development and preservation efforts are guided by meaningful community engagement and coordinated with public investments in infrastructure and services, as put forth in the Mayor’s Housing Plan.
ONS is composed of two divisions and a cross-divisional unit reporting to the Associate Commissioner:
- The Division of Planning and Predevelopment (P&P) is central to developing and managing HPD's housing production pipeline from project proposal phases through the land use review and entitlement process, to ensure that HPD's investments contribute to building strong, healthy, resilient neighborhoods in all five boroughs. The advertised position is a member of this division.
- The Division of Neighborhood Development & Stabilization (ND&S) leads the agency's commitment to neighborhood planning and strategic preservation through engagement with tenants, landlords, community leaders, and neighborhood stakeholders as we work to enable strong and healthy neighborhoods anchored by affordable housing.
- The Strategic Initiatives Unit (SIU) leads special ONS initiatives and provides essential technical, planning, and policy support to staff and the Associate Commissioner of Neighborhood Strategies.

Your Impact:

As the Director of Manhattan Planning, you will lead a talented group of planning professionals in advancing the goals and vision of the Mayor’s Housing Plan. The Manhattan Planning Unit is at the forefront of HPD’s new construction pre-development pipeline and regularly engages developers, community-based organizations, and public officials to create and advance affordable housing opportunities in Manhattan. The Manhattan Planning Unit is responsible for driving projects that will ultimately result in the creation of thousands of homes, dozens of new community facilities, as well as significant new retail opportunities. The Director of Manhattan Planning reports to the Assistant Commissioner of Planning and Predevelopment.

Your Role:

The Director of Manhattan Planning leads and supervises a team of four energetic, thoughtful, and engaged planners that manage the land use approval process and environmental reviews of City-owned parcels and/or projects financed or sponsored by HPD for the development of affordable housing in Manhattan, and to ensure that projects meet HPD and other City policy objectives.

Your Responsibilities:

Under the supervision of the Assistant Commissioner of Planning and Predevelopment, the Director of Manhattan Planning develops, implements, and manages all Manhattan Planning activities. Specifically, you will be expected to:
Planning and Project Management

- Promote HPD and City policy objectives across all Manhattan Planning activities.
- Perform and make reports about technical analyses of sites that require advanced understanding of zoning, land use, and general planning principles.
- Coordinate with other HPD Divisions; other City and State agencies, such as the Department of City Planning and the Economic Development Corporations; for- and non-profit housing and community developers, Community Boards and community-based organizations; public officials; and residents through the land use approvals process.
- Collaborate with the ONS Predevelopment Planning and Urban Design Unit on the Request for Proposals (RFP) review and selection process.
- Partner with the Division of Neighborhood Development and Stabilization on neighborhood planning and preservation efforts.
- Present the team’s projects at meetings of the community board or other stakeholders.
- Participate in neighborhood workshops, as necessary.

Strategy and Operations
- Serve as the ONS and/or agency lead for special planning projects in Manhattan, such as the Manhattan Plan and the 100 Gold Street RFP.
- Work with planners to troubleshoot and navigate complex planning issues as they arise in projects and elevate issues and proposed solutions to senior leadership and key stakeholders, as needed.
- Create, implement, and maintain consistent, efficient operations procedures.
- Ensure that all projects move efficiently through the approvals process and fulfill all requirements.
- At the discretion of the Assistant Commissioner, represent the Division and/or Agency at public meetings and forums.

Team Management and Supervision
- Define, manage, and track team priorities and work assignments.
- Meet regularly with individual staff members, as well as the entire team to review and evaluate work, communicate priorities, and provide coaching.
- Identify staffing needs and advocate for resources.

Preferred skills:
- Subject-matter expertise: Knowledge of New York City government, affordable housing, land use, and urban planning issues. A minimum of six years of professional experience in a related field; candidates with master’s degrees in urban planning, real estate development, public administration, public policy, or a related field are strongly preferred.
- Project management, including the ability to execute: Proven ability to manage complex projects with multiple internal and external stakeholders; to receive direction and anticipate next steps; to think through, communicate, document, organize, and execute on project goals and keep other team members on schedule. Ability to manage up, down, and across teams. Attentive to details, organized, and demonstrated ability to follow through.
- Analytical and technical expertise: Knowledge of best practices in urban planning, affordable housing, real estate development, and land use policy. Ability to work with, understand, analyze, and communicate qualitative, quantitative, and geospatial information in a variety of formats.
- People management: Experience managing teams and an interest in building staff development and coaching skills.
- Problem-solving: The ability to combine analytic and technical planning skills with empathy and persuasion to break complex challenges into manageable tasks, generate consensus on contentious issues, and influence both subject-matter experts and senior-level decision-makers.
- Communication: Strong written, verbal, and presentation skills. Proven ability to produce high-quality materials in a variety of formats for internal and external audiences.
- Good judgment: Ability to analyze a situation, understand what is needed, understand when additional input is needed, flag or resolve issues as necessary, and escalate when appropriate.
- Collaborative and creative spirit: Excited to be part of a team, to work with others to solve problems creatively, and get quality work done. Ability to hear, take, and give feedback effectively and productively and to motivate peers to get the job done.
- Civil service: The candidate selected for the Director of Manhattan Planning must be permanent in the City Planner Civil Service title or another qualifying Civil Service title OR be on the active City Planner Civil Service list or another qualifying Civil Service list to be eligible for this role. Selected candidates will be asked to provide written confirmation that they currently hold a relevant permanent title or are on a qualifying Civil Service list.

Please submit a resume, cover letter, and proof of Civil Service eligibility with your application. Applications without cover letters will not be considered.

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1. A baccalaureate degree from an accredited college or university and two years of satisfactory full-time experience in city planning; or

2. A satisfactory combination of education and/or experience that is equivalent to “1"" above. Graduate
education in city planning, urban planning, urban design, architecture, landscape architecture, transportation engineering, public administration, economic development or related fields may be substituted for experience on the basis of 30 graduate semester credits from an accredited college for one year of experience. However, all candidates must have a baccalaureate degree.

Special Qualification Requirements

Assignment Level III
To be eligible for placement in Assignment Level III, individuals must have, after meeting the minimum requirements, one additional year of professional experience as described in "2" above.

Assignment Level IV
To be eligible for placement in Assignment Level IV, individuals must have, after meeting the minimum requirements, two additional years of professional experience as described in "2" above.

This position is also open to qualified persons with a disability who are eligible for the 55-a Program. Please indicate at the top of your resume and cover letter that you would like to be considered for the position through the 55-a Program.

As a prospective employee of the City of New York, you may be eligible for federal loan forgiveness programs and state repayment assistance programs. For more information, please visit the U.S. Department of Education’s website at https://studentaid.gov/pslf/.

New York City residency is generally required within 90 days of appointment. However, City Employees in certain titles who have worked for the City for 2 continuous years may also be eligible to reside in Nassau, Suffolk, Putnam, Westchester, Rockland, or Orange County. To determine if the residency requirement applies to you, please discuss with the agency representative at the time of interview.

The City of New York is an inclusive equal opportunity employer committed to recruiting and retaining a diverse workforce and providing a work environment that is free from discrimination and harassment based upon any legally protected status or protected characteristic, including but not limited to an individual's sex, race, color, ethnicity, national origin, age, religion, disability, sexual orientation, veteran status, gender identity, or pregnancy.