Providing expertise on how arts connect economic and community development

Arts Build Communities Executive Board

Chair: Suzanne Ishee, Producer, Broadway Center Stage Productions
Suzanne Ishee (Chair) is an Emmy and Drama Desk Award winning producer, actor and playwright.  She continues to play leading roles having performed in a multitude of Broadway, Off-Broadway and regional theatres and she is soloist for symphonies and arts series throughout North America. Suzanne produces major special events most notably for international music festivals. Carnegie Hall and The Theatre League and with her company, Broadway Center Stage, she  creates and produces chamber musicals. She was instrumental in the organizational development of Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS and has also served on the boards of The International School of Performing Arts and advisory board of The Balm In Gilead. Suzanne has been a lifelong advocate for artists as catalysts for social change and is an active member of Actors Equity Association, American Guild of Musical Artists, The Dramatists Guild, and the NJ Board of Realtors focusing on growing community cultural capital.  She and husband, Michael, live in Maplewood.

Joseph Barris, AICP/PP, Supervising Planner, Monmouth County Planning Board
Joseph M. Barris, P.P., A.I.C.P.  Mr. Barris has been a staff member with the Monmouth County Division of Planning since June 2003 and a Supervising Planner with the Long Range Planning Section since March 2006.  He received a Bachelor of Science Degree in Environmental Science from Cook College, Rutgers University and a Master’s Degree in City and Regional Planning, from the Rutgers University Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy.  His career has been one of diverse interests and assignments in the fields of environmental planning, transportation, development review, parks and open space, redevelopment, master plan and ordinance writing, as well as Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technology.  As a project manager he has incorporated planning for the arts into Monmouth County's regional studies; reinforcing the importance and affect that the arts have on both the local economy and community identity.  He is a board member of the recently formed Freehold Borough Arts Council. He is a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners and a licensed Professional Planner in New Jersey.

Morris Bellamy, former Director, Community and Cultural Development, City of Melbourne, Australia
Morris Bellamy has extensive experience in cultural and community planning in both large urban and rural contexts based on his work at the City of Melbourne, Australia’s leading city for the arts.  He served as both Manager of Arts and Culture and Manager of Community Development and led the development of arts strategies for that city overseeing major initiatives in the arts and community development.  He places particular emphasis on his role as the 'driver' for the culture theme in the development of Future Melbourne, the city’s blueprint for the next 20 years and the importance of integrating arts and culture within a broader planning context for communities and places. He was president of the board of the principal community health service for inner Melbourne and a director on large not-for-profit organizations for aged care, regional libraries and public archives. He moved to Princeton in 2010 with his wife, Anne.

Stuart Koperweis, MPPPS and former President, Jersey City Economic Development Corporation
Stuart Z. Koperweis has more than twenty five years of experience in economic growth, revitalization and development, having served U.S. Congressmen and Mayors.  As president of S3X Associates, LLC consultants he has assisted both municipal governments and private corporations from New York to Colorado utilizing the moniker "making public/private partnerships simple.” As Director of Government/Corporate Relations for Downtown New Jersey, Inc. (DNJ), a state wide organization working with downtowns, he has been instrumental in developing alliances and partnerships with numerous statewide organizations.  Mr. Koperweis has overseen  the effective formation of Special Improvement Districts (SID), Urban Enterprise Zone (UEZ) programs, Economic Development Corporations (EDC); Transit Oriented Development (TOD) impact studies, and progressive economic incentive programs – embodied in the Holistic Urban Building (HUB) approach – which he has developed utilizing the Arts. Mr. Koperweis lives with his wife and three children on Deal Lake, adjacent to Historic Asbury Park.

Karen Pinzolo, Arts Plan New Jersey Program Director, ArtPride New Jersey
For the past 30 years, Karen Pinzolo has worked with the nonprofit arts community in Washington, DC; New York City and New Jersey in fundraising, communications, planning, volunteerism, advocacy, research and program management. Her experience ranges from National Endowment for the Arts, world-class performing groups to community arts organizations. She earned her undergraduate degree from American University in Aesthetic Education and has taught visual arts and dance. Inspired by coordinating a national conference on Arts and City Planning for the Americans for the Arts, Ms. Pinzolo earned an MPA at New York University concentrating in cultural planning and nonprofit management. For the past 9 years, Ms. Pinzolo has worked with the New Jersey State Council on the Arts and ArtPride NJ Foundation in directing Arts Plan NJ, a statewide plan for creating a better New Jersey through and for the arts. Ms. Pinzolo sits on the Steering Committees of the NJ Arts Education Partnership, Creative NJ and the Alliance of Arts and Health New
Jersey.

Staff

	Leonardo Vazquez, AICP/PP, (Director) is a co-founder of Arts Build Communities. He has more than 15 years of experience as a community and economic development planner, and has special expertise in creative placemaking, cultural competency, leadership development, and strategic communications. He is a co-founder and former director of the Professional Development Institute and The Leading Institute at Rutgers University's Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy. He is the author of Leading from the Middle: Strategic Thinking for Planning and Community Development Professionals; co-editor of Dialogos: Placemaking in Latino Communities; and author of dozens of essays and articles on creative placemaking, diversity, leadership and urban planning practice. He is the principal author of all reports produced by Arts Build Communities and the lead (i.e., principal investigator) for all research and technical assistance conducted by ABC. He is a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners and a licensed Professional Planner in New Jersey.
	Max Azzarello (Program Associate) hails from an idyllic patch of land called Sea Cliff on the North Shore of Long Island, New York, and studied Anthropology and Public Policy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is currently getting his Master in City and Regional Planning from the Bloustein School. He is well-versed in using creative placemaking as a community and economic development tool, having worked with the New Brunswick, New Jersey Special Improvement District to strengthen their use of the arts, and having helped envision new public art projects in New Brunswick for a course on Art and City Design. He is particularly interested in using new technologies and creative strategies in the areas of crowdsourcing, gamification (the use of game mechanics in real-life situations) and direct citizen participation to strengthen community and economic development.

Partners

ArtPride New Jersey

Cultural Strategies Institute

Discover Jersey Arts

New York Foundation for the Arts

Sustainable Jersey

Supporters

Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation

New Jersey State Council on the Arts