A Community Land Trust is governed by a democratically elected tripartite Board of Directors, with one-third leaseholder members (residents or workers on CLT land), one-third general community members from the service area, and one-third public members who bring additional expertise. BVCLT follows this structure to ensure balanced representation and accountability.
While the Board sets vision and policy, staff implement the work supporting organizing, cooperative development, acquisitions, and long-term stewardship in alignment with the community’s direction.
Our Staff
Ara K.
Director of real estate & Asset management
Ara (they/them) grew up in Southern California and currently lives in Koreatown. Ara is rooted in moving away from extractive systems and towards solidarity economies, creating other liberatory ways for everyone to thrive. Ara brings 10+ years of experience in affordable housing development in California, working with diverse affordable housing developers, community land trusts, community development financial institutions, foundations, and public agencies. They have managed all stages of real estate development, including site acquisition, securing necessary land use approvals, design development, financing, construction management and lease up. Through this work, they have contributed to the development of 1000+ multifamily housing units serving low-income individuals and families. Ara holds a Master’s degree in Urban and Regional Planning from UCLA and a Bachelor’s degree in History from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. In their free time, Ara likes to be outdoors around plants, reading or with their cats.
Citlalli V.
Director of Resident & Land Stewardship
Citlalli (she/any pronouns) grew up in Los Angeles and received her BA from Georgetown University. Prior to joining Beverly-Vermont Community Land Trust, she worked as a Cooperative Developer with the L.A. Co-op Lab, supporting worker cooperatives through education, technical assistance, and lending, and previously organized with tenants in Washington, D.C., where she supported rent strikes, TOPA campaigns, cooperative conversions, and citywide housing justice efforts. At BVCLT, she leads resident organizing, stewardship, and leadership development, working alongside residents to strengthen democratic governance, cultivate community leadership, and build systems of collective care that empower residents to shape their communities and the future of the organization. In her free time, she enjoys gardening, karaoke with friends, and cuddling with her pets.
haejin b.
Director of Cultural Arts & Base building
haejin (any pronouns) was born and raised on occupied Tongva land in Koreatown and Central Los Angeles. As the Director of Cultural Arts & Base Building at Beverly-Vermont Community Land Trust, they lead community organizing through cultural arts, political education, outreach, and resident engagement. Committed to building racial, class, disability, and gender justice, haejin brings their lived experience growing up disabled, trans, unhoused, and working class into their organizing. Prior to joining BVCLT, they supported vendors at the North Hollywood Swap Meet facing displacement and have long used art, storytelling, and cultural practice to build community power. Their work centers listening, trans diaspora, and the body, with a focus on pansori and Corean folk drumming. haejin is a former California Arts Council Community Artist Fellow and Fulbright Fellow in South Korea, and currently serves as an Emerge Fellow at the Longmore Institute on Disability. In their free time, they enjoy making art, music, and zines with friends, tending to land and body, practicing intentional movement, and slowing down.
Kasey V.
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Since joining Beverly-Vermont Community Land Trust as its first staff organizer, Kasey (he/they/any) has helped grow the organization into a regional leader in community ownership by expanding BVCLT’s portfolio of community-led housing, securing major public and philanthropic investments, and advancing policies that strengthen community control of land across Los Angeles County. Raised in a working-class family between Koreatown and South Central Los Angeles, Kasey’s work is grounded in the belief that people have the power to shape their own futures with dignity and self-determination. Their work bridges community organizing, real estate development, coalition building, and organizational leadership to create lasting models of community ownership and ensure residents have the power to shape the future of the neighborhoods they call home. Outside of work, they enjoy boxing, traveling, reading, and spending time with friends.
Liz L.
Community Organizer
Liz (they/them) was born and raised on unceded Tongva land in Pico-Union. Their organizing is rooted in their experience growing up in a working-class neighborhood and witnessing the exploitation their parents faced as garment workers. Liz’s organizing approach centers leadership development, ensuring those most impacted are at the forefront while building spaces that foster collective liberation. In their free time, they enjoy reading, spending time with friends, watching campy horror movies, and playing with their cat, Marcy.
Rebecca B.
Finnance & Operations Manager
Rebecca (they/she) is the Finance & Operations Manager at Beverly-Vermont Community Land Trust. As a first-generation Nicaraguan and longtime advocate for immigrant and working-class communities, Rebecca is passionate about advancing housing justice, community ownership, and equitable development. She holds a B.A. in Gender, Ethnicity, and Multicultural Studies from California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, and an M.A. in Latin American Studies from California State University, Los Angeles.
Board of Directors
Matthew V.
PResident
Public Member
Matt (he/any) is the queer son of Vietnam War refugees, a lifelong student, activist, and community builder. Raised in the Bay Area, he graduated from UC San Diego with a B.A. in Ethnic Studies before moving to Los Angeles in 2015. For over 15 years, Matt has organized to advance economic, housing, and racial justice through campaigns that have expanded community ownership, strengthened grassroots organizing, and built political power across California. His work has included helping establish the Asian American Studies Minor at UC San Diego, leading electoral and community campaigns, and developing popular education and organizing trainings that support community and labor movements throughout Los Angeles County. Today, Matt continues to support community ownership efforts across the region and serves as an advisor to the Altadena Earthseed Community Land Trust.
Ixchel H.
Vice PResident
Leaseholder Member
Ixchel (she/her/ella) is the proud daughter of a janitor and a restaurant worker who moved their family from Oaxaca, Mexico, to Los Angeles in 2001. Raised with the values of hard work and perseverance, she has dedicated her life to advancing housing justice and community leadership. Ixchel began organizing as a youth with Children Over Politics and later became a tenant organizer in Koreatown, where she co-founded Señoras For Housing Inc., Beverly-Vermont Community Land Trust’s second limited-equity housing cooperative, and now serves as its board president. She holds a Master of Arts from California State University, Northridge, and uses both organizing and art-ivism to explore gentrification, displacement, and the immigrant experience. Through her work, Ixchel is committed to honoring the dignity of labor and building community power alongside working-class families.
Jamie P.
Treasurer
Public Member
Jamie (she/her) is deeply committed to fostering sustainable affordable living through community-led initiatives. As the former Resident Manager of the Urban Soil Tierra Urbana co-op at the Los Angeles Eco-Village, she gained hands-on experience cultivating resilient, locally focused projects that connect people with the resources needed for sustainable living. This practical experience, coupled with her prior service as President of the Wilshire Center Koreatown Neighborhood Council, provides her with a strong foundation in both grassroots community development and local governance. She believes this unique blend of experience makes her a strong advocate for the Beverly-Vermont Community Land Trust’s mission and is eager to contribute to its vital work in ensuring housing accessibility and promoting sustainable practices for the community.
Deshanae C.
Secretary
Public Member
Deshanae (she/her) is a dedicated community leader with experience as a peer support specialist, home health aide, organizer, facilitator, tenant association leader, and advocate for community ownership. Passionate about building a future rooted in care for both people and place, she works alongside neighbors to strengthen resident leadership and collective power. In 2022, Deshanae participated in the Beverly-Vermont Community Land Trust’s Community Ownership Fellowship and helped organize in support of Measure ULA to expand funding for housing preservation and community ownership in Los Angeles. After founding a tenant association in her building when it was listed for sale in 2021, she continues organizing with the long-term vision of acquiring the property and transforming it into a resident-owned housing cooperative.
Margarita Q.
leaseholder Member
Margarita (she/her/ella) is a resident of Beverly-Vermont Community Land Trust’s North Hollywood property and originally from El Salvador, where she worked as a teacher. She was introduced to the community land trust model when BVCLT acquired her building through the LA County Community Land Trust Pilot Program. With support from BVCLT, Margarita was able to reunite with her husband and establish a stable home for her family. In 2022, she joined the BVCLT Community Ownership Fellowship, where she deepened her understanding of community land trusts, shared ownership, and resident leadership while participating in advocacy efforts to expand community ownership funding. Today, Margarita is committed to organizing her neighbors and building a strong tenant-led governance structure at her property.
Mary M.
leaseholder Member
Mary (she/her/ella), also known as Mari, is a single mother whose family is from Oaxaca, Mexico, and who has called Los Angeles’ Koreatown home for decades. Before joining the Beverly-Vermont Community Land Trust, she helped organize a tenant association in her building and successfully fought against redevelopment plans that threatened to displace her and her neighbors. In 2021, BVCLT purchased the property, and together with her neighbors, she co-founded Señoras For Housing Inc., the organization’s second limited-equity housing cooperative, where she serves as a board member. Mary also serves on the BVCLT Board of Directors and is a resident leader dedicated to advancing housing justice and collective stewardship. She draws on her lived experience in tenant organizing and cooperative housing to inspire others to engage in community ownership, resident leadership, and building collective community power.
Dani K.
leaseholder Member
Dani (they/them) is a Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist and has been a resident of Urban Soil–Tierra Urbana at the Los Angeles Eco-Village for the past 11 years. Through their experience in cooperative housing, Dani has developed skills in facilitation, mediation, and consensus-based decision-making while witnessing firsthand how resident-led communities foster stability, belonging, and mutual support. Originally from Texas, Dani brings a deep commitment to supporting communities facing displacement and believes cooperative housing is a powerful tool for helping people remain rooted in their neighborhoods while building lasting relationships and collective care.
Carmina S.
leaseholder Member
Carmina (she/her/ella) was born and raised in East Hollywood and is of Salvadoran and Filipino descent. Through her lived experience as a transit-dependent youth and navigating housing insecurity, she developed a deep understanding of the connection between access to dignified housing, mobility, and the belief that both are fundamental human rights. She is a new mother and a resident of the Beverly-Vermont Community Land Trust.
Eun Young Y.
General Member
Eunyoung (she/her) is a longtime community member and organizer who has called Los Angeles’ Koreatown home for over 30 years. She has advocated for survivors of gender-based violence at Korean American Family Services and organized workers with the Koreatown Immigrant Workers Alliance, building strong connections across local and transnational communities between Los Angeles and Korea. Today, she serves as a representative of Peace 21 LA, where she leads political education, outreach, and community-building efforts that strengthen relationships and create spaces for members of the Korean diaspora to organize and support one another.
Eni C.
General Member
Eni (they/them) is the child of immigrants who settled in Los Angeles’ Little Bangladesh neighborhood in the 1990s before their family moved to North Hollywood. They have since returned to Little Bangladesh to deepen their roots in the community and, as the 2023–2024 Outreach Fellow for the Beverly-Vermont Community Land Trust, helped engage more Bangladeshi Americans in the housing justice movement. Eni is committed to fostering authentic relationships with people and place, believing that solidarity grows through shared stewardship and collective care. Today, they help steward BVCLT’s White House Place Learning Garden, cultivating community connections through the shared care of the land.
Jackie P.
General Member
With deep roots in tenant organizing and language justice, Jackie (she/they) has provided interpretation for tenant-led organizations in local and international efforts, including the Beverly-Vermont Community Land Trust. Jackie is formerly a Project Attorney for a clinic working with self-represented tenants in eviction cases and is committed to disrupting systems that favor displacement and incarceration, both in and out of the courts. Some of Jackie’s favorite things include fellow abortion doulas at the Los Angeles Abortion Support Collective, capturing community, subcultures, and third places on film, and communicating through memes.
J-Mo M.
Public Member
J-Mo (she/her/ella) was born and raised in El Sereno on the Eastside of Los Angeles, where her organizing journey began through youth-led programs at Woodrow Wilson High School. Those experiences sparked a lifelong commitment to educational, housing, and racial justice and led her to earn a degree in Ethnic Studies with a minor in Education Studies from the University of California, San Diego. She later returned to InnerCity Struggle to organize alongside youth and parents, advancing campaigns for rent stabilization and equitable land use across Los Angeles County. J-Mo previously served as a Program Manager at the Funders’ Collaborative on Youth Organizing, where she helped oversee nearly $5 million in grants supporting youth-led and intergenerational organizing nationwide. She has also served on the boards of multiple community organizations and community land trusts and remains dedicated to building community power, developing leaders, and advancing transformative social change.
