Mayor Parker’s development and planning team is finally taking shape 10 months into her term

Ten months into Mayor Cherelle L. Parker’s administration, it’s finally becoming clear who will lead the city’s planning and development arm.

On Friday Parker announced that Jessie Lawrence will be the permanent director of the Department of Planning and Development. Lawrence had been an assistant deputy mayor under Aren Platt, chief deputy mayor for planning and strategic initiatives.

The announcement comes after Platt made a surprise announcement Thursday that he will be leaving city government.

The department oversees a variety of powerful and influential city institutions, including the Zoning Board of Adjustment, the Planning Commission, and the Historical Commission. Its staffers are charged with advising community groups, developers, and politicians, even drawing up legislation for the mayor and, often, for City Council concerning housing, development, and land use.

“You may not know who Jessie Lawrence is yet, but that is about to change,” said Parker on Friday afternoon, specifically citing his work on the real estate and housing aspects of the 76ers arena deal.

It is unclear if Lawrence will report directly to Parker, or if new deputy mayor Vanessa Garrett-Harley will take over this aspect of Platt’s portfolio. The mayor said she plans to make an announcement clarifying the chain of command as soon as next week.

Details are also still being awaited on the policies that will fuel the mayor’s goal of 30,000 homes built or repaired during her first term, which Parker has been hinting would be expanded upon since August leading to speculation that the long-delayed leadership appointments were hampering the policy.

“That level of investment has never occurred here in the city of Philadelphia,” said Parker. “We will unveil and deliver on that housing plan for Philadelphia, and Jessie Lawrence is going to lead our efforts to accomplish this critical task for all of our residents.”

Lawrence has been with the city for over 13 years, with a brief break to work for real estate developer Streamline Development. He has a good reputation with developers and housing advocates, and when he worked with the perennially troubled Philadelphia Land Bank he was considered its most responsive and transparent bureaucrat.

“The overall improvement of Philadelphia, the stabilization of its neighborhoods, reconnection of communities, the development of housing, and, more importantly, the impact of affordable communities, have always been my guiding principles,” said Lawrence at the news conference.

Parker also announced that Octavia Howell of Pew Charitable Trusts will be the new director of the department’s Planning Commission, returning to its headquarters at 1515 Arch St. ten years after she left that same agency as a staffer.

“What you should know about me is I love cities, and Philly in particular,” said Howell. “But I also love data and maps and the things that are important to be able to understand how to make a city run, how to make a city work, and improve its public realm.”

The appointments come after nearly a year of uncertainty at the department.

At the beginning of 2024, Platt fired the interim director of planning and development, Eleanor Sharpe, for reasons that were never made public.

The department’s head of development services, John Mondlak, served as the interim director of the department in the aftermath and has been the face of Parker’s ambitious drive to build 30,000 homes in four years. On Friday, Parker announced he will now serve as Lawrence’s chief of staff.

At the beginning of 2024, the long-serving deputy director for housing and community development, Melissa Long, was fired as well. Her expertise on complex federal housing regulations was seen, within the department, as irreplicable. Long’s replacement has yet to be hired.

Sharpe, meanwhile, has been hired by City Council President Kenyatta Johnson as Council’s director of planning. The hiring of a veteran leader so recently let go by the mayor’s office raised eyebrows among City Hall observers, who carefully parse the relationship between the legislative and executive branches of local government.

“Her expertise in planning and zoning in Philadelphia and [experience as] a former executive director of the Philadelphia City Planning Commission will be invaluable as City Council works with Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle Parker’s administration on a variety of planning issues impacting Philadelphia in the years to come,” Johnson’s communications director, Vincent Thompson, wrote in an email to The Inquirer.

Also Friday, the chair of the Philadelphia Historical Commission, which sits within the Planning and Development Department, announced he would be stepping down while continuing to serve on the board. Architect Bob Thomas has chaired the commission for eight years.

His replacement, approved at a Friday meeting, will be affordable real estate developer Zachary Frankel, who first joined the commission last month. He was approved by his fellow commissioners in a 10-0 vote, with two abstentions.

Longtime commission member Emily Cooperman abstained from the vote, noting that she did not know Frankel yet and that the new leadership role seemed sudden. Some advocates have expressed ambivalence about a developer chairing the commission, but Frankel described himself as committed to the historic fabric of Philadelphia.

“I am a preservationist first and foremost,” said Frankel. “To chair this role that is so vital to the physical infrastructure of the city is a great responsibility that I couldn’t turn down.”