Kimberley McLean ’08

The Great Recession was at its height when Kimberley McLean graduated from St. John’s Law in 2008. Although she never planned to practice real estate law, she couldn’t pass up a solid job offer in a down market. Soon, as an associate at a small Long Island law firm, she was hard at work litigating landlord-tenant matters and handling a range of commercial and residential transactions.

As she built practical knowledge and skills, McLean had an insider’s view of a growing New York City housing crisis rooted in predatory lending to homeowners in historically underserved and marginalized communities. Drawn to be of service, and to help people access and remain in affordable housing, she left private practice to become a staff attorney at the nonprofit Neighborhood Housing Services of Jamaica, Inc. (NHSJ). “The foreclosure crisis demanded legal minds on staff to help create solutions in real time, and I saw this as an opportunity to utilize much of my legal training,” McLean says. NHSJ has been doing the vital work of preserving, protecting, and revitalizing neighborhoods in southern Queens since 1974. It offers housing education, counseling, and financial services to low-to-moderate- income residents to help them access sustainable, affordable housing. NHSJ also partners with local government, businesses, and residents to promote homeownership and community reinvestment.

Tasked with representing NHSJ in all legal matters, McLean counsels the organization and its clients and serves as a political liaison. “NHSJ has a broad mission that I support in conversations with clients, lenders, elected officials, and everyone I’m in contact with,” she explains. “A typical day involves the intake and counseling of clients, advocating on behalf of clients, advocating on behalf of the organization, and assisting with grant applications, among other responsibilities.”

McLean’s professional stake in NHSJ’s mission is matched by a personal one. “I’m a Queens resident, so I have a vested interest in the vitality and affordability of my neighborhood for challenged populations,” she shares. Those challenges trace back to redlining practices that cemented housing inequality in southeast Jamaica and across southern Queens. NHSJ formed to help right those historic wrongs, and it continues to address them as they manifest in the community.

Now, with many Queens residents experiencing the pandemic’s disproportionate impact, NHSJ is setting new benchmarks that will enable the organization to go beyond what it’s already achieved, McLean says. “We’re here for our southern Queens neighbors. We’re here because they deserve a new stock of safe, accessible, and affordable housing. We’re here to help them stay in the homes they have and love. These, and others, are the goals we roll up our sleeves to meet every day, and I can’t think of anything I would rather be doing.”