The Kelsey

The Kelsey will leverage recognition from this prize to unlock additional resources, accelerates timelines, and de-risks impactful housing innovations. Over 61 million Americans with disabilities are continually overlooked when it comes to housing and are more likely to face housing discrimination, experience homelessness, and be unable to afford average rents. The issue has been exacerbated by COVID-19 and is most acutely felt in communities of color and low-income communities. In addition to inclusive and accessible housing, this prize would advance The Kelsey’s work of providing access to support services, true community, and the related economic, social, and health opportunities made possible by having a stable home.

With your support, The Kelsey’s will have 550+ homes for people with and without disabilities in the pipeline in 2025. We receive inquiries weekly from people across California and the country (14 states and counting) asking us to bring The Kelsey to their communities or asking to use our research.  We are designing for scale and committed to the fact that The Kelsey’s work in the Bay Area won’t be one of a kind, but the first of its kind, ready to be brought to cities and states across the globe. 

I co-founded The Kelsey with my cousin Kelsey, who continues to inspire and inform our mission and work today, though she is no longer with us. Kelsey had multiple significant disabilities and, as result, I saw firsthand how the housing crisis affected adults with developmental disabilities and their families. The Kelsey exists to turn the challenge of disability housing into the opportunity of inclusive community.  

 I completed my MPP at Harvard Kennedy School focusing on housing, disability inclusion, and community development. I was a Cheng Fellow at the Harvard Social Innovation and Change Initiative where I worked on designing The Kelsey. Prior to The Kelsey, I was founder and CEO of Unified Theater, a disability inclusive arts program that was acquired and has been implemented in schools throughout the United States.

The Kelsey is an organization pioneering disability-forward housing solutions that open doors to more affordable homes and opportunities for everyone.  This innovative solution is being built first in California and will scale as a national model.   

 We’re a non-profit organization with the mission of accelerating and advocating for housing that is inclusive and take a cross-disability approach to support multiple types of disabilities in both how a building is designed and programmed. We also center racial equity in our community outreach, design, and building program. We’re building houses within communities that are an intentional mix of housing for adults with disabilities, affordable housing and middle-income housing, all integrated into one community development. Our priority is inclusion, not isolation or segregation based on income or ability. 

 In less than three years, The Kelsey has secured the co-development of more than 240 inclusive and affordable homes in one of the nation's most challenging housing markets. In parallel to building our housing communities and raising the necessary funds, The Kelsey also advances policy advocacy and community organizing and awareness that support these goals.

The Kelsey is pioneering housing solutions that center on the perspectives of people with disabilities. The Kelsey is committed to innovation in its development to create a best-in-class community for our residents and support a model that can be replicated, learned from, and scaled to other communities.  

Well-intended, intentional communities for people with disabilities revert to protective or medical institutional models that segregate people and limit choice and control. Scattered sites physically place people in the community but never provide the supports for people to actually access it inclusively. The Kelsey, from early community organizing to design to housing management, is disrupting the housing development norms by holding inclusion at the core of what we do. The Kelsey helps people with disabilities to be visible, valued, and supported members of communities.

The Kelsey is uniquely in how we unlock new public, private, and philanthropic resources, design a model that has scalability through commercial and government adoption, and combine a mission that does direct housing development work informed by and spread through advocacy and field building across our sector.

We are designing for scale and committed to the fact that The Kelsey’s work in the Bay Area won’t be one of a kind, but the first of its kind and ready to be brought to cities and states across the globe. We will document and share all aspects of our building process, so that others can replicate and learn from our journey. We house our education, outreach and advocacy efforts in our Learn Center. We host online webinars, in-person and video tours of our Bay Area projects, and convenings. Both private and public funders will be engaged to not just invest in our model and fund, but to also adopt our financing approach to build affordable and inclusive housing.

Over 950+ community advocates with and without disabilities have engaged in and informed our work. The Kelsey invests in the professional development of disabled leaders to create a more inclusive housing sector and transform how housing is built. Through the Raise the Roof initiative, we support and partner with the diverse, growing nationwide network of disabled leaders who are building housing credentials and becoming more informed, strategic housing advocates for affordable, accessible, and inclusive communities.