Building Homes and Hope

Julia Moran Morton '83 planned to be a doctor. Her mother, Gail — a volunteer at the Lawrence, Massachusetts, non-profit Neighbors in Need near their home in Andover — "instilled in me a strong sense of giving back to the community," says Julia, who was 12 when her mom was diagnosed with breast cancer. "I don't know if the career choice came from her being sick and me wanting to find the cure ... but I wanted to help people through medicine."

At Brooks, Julia's favorite class was AP Biology with Nick Evangelos, where she did EMT training, and Polly Vanasse's chemistry class, where she did a project on chemotherapy, shadowing her mom in treatment, before entering Connecticut College with plans to go pre-med. And today she is actually helping people rebound in their lives and heal — only in a very different way: as chief housing development officer at the Washington, D.C., non-profit SOME (So Others Might Eat).

Julia Moran Morton '83 (left) with her daughter, Lily Grace, at a Turkey Trot 5k fundraiser organized by So Others Might Eat.

Julia's career has been dedicated to helping low-income individuals and families by developing affordable housing, including multi-family apartments, SROs (single room occupancy) and special needs housing, including for people living with HIV, and even founding a Habitat for Humanity chapter in the Caribbean. It's a list of accomplishments that would have made Julia's mother proud. Sadly, she died when Julia was 19.

"After caring for her when she was sick ... I wondered if I could watch others go through that and feel that pain over and over," Julia says. So she abandoned her plan to go into medicine, majored in psychology, interned with Big Brothers Big Sisters of America counseling kids in low-income housing projects and considered a career in social work. "It was through that experience that I first saw firsthand how people struggled just to have a decent roof over their head," Julia says.

Determined to experience "a more diverse world" after graduation, Julia moved to Washington, D.C., to live with her great aunt for a few months and took a temp job with a luxury real estate developer. The city and gig were "just going to be for the summer," Julia recalls. Thirty years later, she jokes, "It's been a very long summer."

Julia fell in love with the work and spent three years embracing "the eclectic mix" of real estate development: identifying sites for acquisition, researching the zoning, working with an architect on the design, crunching the numbers to determine if a project was economically feasible and procuring financing. "I was enjoying it all," she says, "but something was missing." After attending a fundraiser for the non-profit Jubilee Housing, she found it.

Hearing Jubilee's director tell the story of their organization, Julia says it clicked for her. "That was everything I was doing and loved and also combined the 'heart and soul' part of it, too." She felt she had found her calling. She quit her for-profit job, took the summer off to travel cross-country, then approached Jubilee about a position — only to find one had just opened up. "It felt so serendipitous!" Julia says. The work was all she had hoped for.

"Housing development can be very fast paced and stressful," she says. "But knowing that the end result is someone able to step out of being under-housed or homeless and into a unit they can call home makes it worthwhile."

She enrolled in a master of science program in urban planning with a concentration in housing and real estate development at the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Real Estate Development to take her career a step further. Classes in real estate development, housing policy and social work tied together Julia's passions. "I really like the social work aspect, but found I could make a bigger impact actually building the housing," she says.

And she's done just that throughout her career, directing housing development at organizations including Building Futures and Transitional Housing Corp., before joining SOME in early 2019.

"SOME has had an extraordinary evolution that started 50 years ago with folks handing out sandwiches on the street and grew to fill an entire spectrum of needs for those in poverty," Julia says of the non-profit that provides comprehensive meals and services for the homeless and housing for D.C.'s extremely low-income residents, including transitional and permanent supportive housing, medical services and employment training. "Nearly 10 years ago, SOME declared a goal to develop a thousand units of housing, and we're just about there."

The organization has more than 800 units and two projects under construction now: Anna Cooper House with 47 units for single adults and Karin House, at the historic Walter Reed campus, with 41 efficiency units for seniors. Impressive stats, to be sure, but it's still the personal impact that equals success for Julia.

"It is possible to do this work and not interact with residents," says Julia, who makes a point of entering her office through a housing area so she can say hello to clients and connect with the community, not through the front door. "The most rewarding part, though, is getting to know the people. The people are what it's all about, and the payoff is moving day, seeing them move into a place for the first time and the elation of the kids and adults. I feel a real joy seeing that impact."

There will be more to come, as well, since SOME was just awarded funding from the Department of Housing and Community Development for its next project: the demolition of four townhouses, which currently house short-term transitional housing for people experiencing a mental health emergency, and building a 136-unit high-rise in its place for formerly homeless single adults.

There is a lot on her plate, but, Julia says, "As much as I wish we could put ourselves out of business, there is always a need for those who are falling through the cracks, and I hope to keep making an impact."

How can others find work as satisfying? "Listen to where life is taking you, widen that view and be open to possibilities," she advises. "My career path took me in a completely different direction than the medical path I was on, and it's been fulfilling in ways I never could have planned."