Jim Lutz helped develop more than 450 affordable housing units in St. Louis, St. Louis County and East St. Louis, Ill., over the course of his 30-year career as a community development leader. The University of Missouri–St. Louis alumnus, BA psychology 1973, currently serves as the housing development project manager for Rise, a nonprofit organization that works to revitalize St. Louis-area community neighborhoods. And he is one of several Community Builders Award winners announced this month by the Community Builders Network of Metro St. Louis.

Other Community Builders Award honorees included Fred Bright, mayor of the East Alton, Ill.; Melanie Dileo, vice president of community affairs for Citi Bank; Jason Deem, owner of South Side Spaces; Sts. Joachim & Ann Care Service; Rodney and Juanita Norma; Tim Barry, executive director of Horizon Housing Foundation and past-president of the St. Louis Equity Fund; and the Skinker-DeBalivere Community Council.

“The community development sector in St. Louis is changing for the better. In order to continue our forward momentum, we need to collaborate across the different sectors,” said Todd Swanstrom, the E. Desmond Lee Professor of Community Collaboration and Public Policy Administration at UMSL. “That is why it is so important to gather together to honor dedicated leaders in the public, private and nonprofit sectors who are working to build great neighborhoods.”

Swanstrom helped created the Community Builders Network through his professorship. The CBN is an association of community-building nonprofit organizations devoted to building vibrant neighborhoods.